A 


)EC  12  1911  * 

AL 


3T  101  . C4  5  1907 
Clarke,  William  Newton, 
-1912. 

Can  I  believe  in  God  the 
Father?  . . 


'N 

1841 


r 


THE  FATHER  ? 


LECTURES  DELIVERED  AT  THE  SUMMER 
SCHOOL  OF  THEOLOGY  OF  HARVARD 
UNIVERSITY 

1899 


By  WILLIAM  NEWTON  CLARKE,  D.D. 

Author  of 


“WHAT  SHALL  WE  THINK  OF  CHRISTIANITY”  AND  “  AN 
OUTLINE  OF  CHRISTIAN  THEOLOGY  ” 


CHARLES  SCRIBNER’S  SONS 
NEW  YORK . 1907 


Copyright,  1899, 

By  Charles  Scribner’s  Sons. 


SBtottattjj  press: 

John  Wilson  and  Son,  Cambridge,  U.  S  A. 


TO 

fEtg  iEager  jFdlofcu&tutients, 

THE  MEMBERS  OF 

THE  FIRST  HARVARD  SUMMER  SCHOOL 


OF  THEOLOGY. 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 
in  2019  with  funding  from 
Princeton  Theological  Seminary  Library 


https://archive.org/details/canibelieveingodOOclar_O 


CONTENTS 


Page 


I.  The  Practical  Argument  for  the 

Being  of  God .  3 

II.  Divine  Personality . 59 

III.  The  Relation  between  God  and 

Men . 113 

IV.  The  Moral  Effect  of  the  Doc¬ 

trine  of  God . 165 


I 

THE  PRACTICAL  ARGUMENT  FOR 
THE  BEING  OF  GOD 


i 


CAN  I  BELIEVE  IN  GOD 
THE  FATHER? 

I 

THE  PRACTICAL  ARGUMENT  FOR 
THE  BEING  OF  GOD 

I  suppose  that  every  one  here  present 
knows  something  about  the  difficulty  of 
believing  in  God.  It  is  easy  to  say  “I 
believe  in  God  the  Father  Almighty, 
Maker  of  heaven  and  earth,”  and  to  say 
it  sincerely,  and  a  genuine  confidence  in 
such  a  God  may  be  the  usual  practice  and 
attitude  of  our  life;  nevertheless,  the  fact 
remains  that  to  attain  and  preserve  a  vital 
and  soul-satisfying  belief  in  the  God  and 
Father  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  as  the 
all-embracing  mind  and  the  all-embracing 
heart,  —  to  maintain  a  confidence  in  him 
that  is  worthy  of  a  perfect  God  on  the  one 


4 


THE  PRACTICAL  ARGUMENT 


hand  and  an  immortal  human  spirit  on  the 
other,  —  this  is  an  act  and  practice  that 
demands  our  human  best  and  utmost,  and 
is  beset  with  difficulties  deep  and  high. 
Who  will  say  that  he  is  habitually  satis¬ 
fied  with  his  own  belief  in  God? 

If  a  full  and  fair  census  of  difficulties 
could  be  taken  in  this  present  company,  it 
is  likely  that  we  should  find  the  whole 
field  represented.  I  cannot  go  through 
the  list,  or  do  more  than  recall  the  variety 
and  seriousness  of  the  questions  that  are 
involved.  We  should  find,  in  the  minds 
that  are  here,  the  old  and  well-recited 
arguments  for  the  being  of  God,  —  the 
cosmological,  the  teleological,  the  anthro¬ 
pological,  the  ontological,  and  whatever 
others  there  may  be,  —  and  we  should  find 
cordial  recognition  of  their  strength  so  far 
as  they  go,  and  profound  sense  of  their 
limitations  and  imperfectness.  We  should 
find  the  feeling  that  no  one  of  them  is 
absolutely  beyond  reproach,  and  that,  taken 


FOR  THE  BEING  OF  GOD 


5 


all  together,  they  may  not  make  a  com¬ 
plete  and  always  convincing  proof.  We 
should  find  the  lurking  doubt  whether  any 
argument  or  group  of  arguments  can  ever 
suffice  to  establish  immovably  so  vast  a 
conclusion  as  we  are  seeking  to  validate. 
And  thus,  after  a  survey  of  the  known 
field  and  range  of  deliberate  and  formal 
proofs,  we  should  find  intelligent  minds 
still  reaching  out  for  something  more,  feel¬ 
ing  that  something  more  must  be  attain¬ 
able,  and  longing  for  firm  hold  upon  that 
certainty  which  lies  beyond  the  field  of 
proving. 

In  the  minds  that  are  gathered  here  we 
should  also  find  full  catalogue  of  the 
practical  and  moral  difficulties  in  the  way 
of  belief  in  God.  To  believe  in  God  if 
we  could  see  him  as  he  is,  or  as  we  con¬ 
ceive  him  to  be  when  we  rise  to  the 
thought  of  perfect  wisdom  and  perfect 
love,  this  would  be  as  easy  as  believing  in 
the  sunlight  on  a  summer  morning;  but 


6 


THE  PRACTICAL  ARGUMENT 


to  believe  in  God  in  such  a  world  as  this ! 
I  need  not  try  to  recall  the  forms  in  which 
this  ancient  difficulty  has  been  encoun¬ 
tered  by  the  minds  that  are  now  attending 
to  my  words.  In  a  world  of  storms  and 
shipwrecks  and  impartial  death,  in  a  world 
of  losses  and  disappointments  and  the 
irony  of  fate,  in  a  world  of  crowding  and 
cruelty  and  the  survival  of  the  fittest,  we 
are  asked  to  believe  in  God.  In  a  world 
of  sin  and  shame,  —  of  war  and  bloodshed, 
of  fraud  and  dishonesty,  of  impurity  and 
greed,  of  waste  and  want,  of  pride  and 
jealousy  and  revenge,  —  we  are  asked  to 
believe  in  God.  We  have  met  the  prob¬ 
lem  in  our  personal  lives  with  their  dark 
mysteries,  and  in  our  outlook  upon  the 
large  and  sad  affairs  of  humanity,  and  in 
the  memories  that  are  here  we  should  find 
full  store  of  questionings  whether  it  was 
possible  really  to  believe  in  God  in  such  a 
world  as  this. 

In  the  presence  of  both  these  classes  of 


FOR  THE  BEING  OF  GOD 


7 


difficulties,  the  theoretical  and  the  prac¬ 
tical,  we  have  been  told  that  we  have  need 
of  faith,  the  strong  springing  of  the  spirit 
up  into  a  higher  realm,  the  bold  resorting 
of  the  human  to  the  divine.  In  the  minds 
here  present,  the  difficulties  of  faith  are 
well  known.  Is  there  any  one  there  for 
us  to  fly  to?  If  there  is  a  good  Being 
there,  unseen,  it  is  only  by  the  free  up- 
springing  of  a  heart  in  fellowship  with 
him  in  goodness  that  we  can  find  our¬ 
selves  at  rest  in  him.  Are  we  good 
enough  to  believe  in  a  good  God?  How 
are  we  to  obtain  the  moral  vigor,  the 
elasticity  and  spring  of  spirit,  to  become 
sure  that  there  is  a  congenial  and  fatherly 
goodness  for  us  to  find  and  repose  upon  ? 
In  our  census  of  difficulties,  we  certainly 
should  find  in  many  of  our  own  souls  the 
desolating  consciousness  that  we  are  not 
good  enough  to  believe  in  God.  And 
with  all  the  rest,  there  comes  now  and 
then  to  us,  as  a  check  upon  faith,  the 


8 


THE  PRACTICAL  ARGUMENT 


voice  of  hard  uniformity,  the  report  of 
unpoetical  and  unaspiring  science,  sug¬ 
gesting  that  even  as  God  is  nowhere  found 
by  searching,  so  there  is  no  need  of  him, 
since  all  is  going  smoothly  whether  he  is 
known  or  not.  With  such  a  counter¬ 
summons,  what  wonder  that  our  faith  does 
not  always  rise  at  the  call  of  the  divine, 
and  that  we  can  find  among  our  memories 
the  shuddering  thought,  “What  if,  after 
all,  there  should  prove  to  be  nothing  in 
it?  What  if  the  sight  of  our  eyes  were 
showing  us  all  there  is?” 

I  am  not  saying  that  these  are  bars  to 
belief  in  God.  They  are  not  final  or 
fatal  difficulties,  for  they  have  been  over¬ 
come,  and  can  be  overcome  again.  I 
believe  in  God,  or  I  should  not  be  here 
speaking  of  him;  and  yet  I  know  the 
meaning  of  all  these  difficulties  that.  I 
have  hinted  at,  and  am  well  convinced 
that  my  auditors  know  them  as  thor¬ 
oughly  as  I.  Such  difficulties  do  beset 


FOR  THE  BEING  OF  GOD 


9 


the  common  mind  of  man,  and  they  are  so 
great  that  the  way  of  clear  and  satisfac¬ 
tory  belief  in  God  is  by  no  means  a  plain 
path.  It  might  seem  easier  if  the  difficul¬ 
ties  were  found  in  the  philosopher’s  coun¬ 
try,  where  trained  minds  might  grapple 
with  them  in  solitude,  while  the  common 
man  went  free.  But  the  distinction  be¬ 
tween  philosophical  problems  and  practi¬ 
cal  every-day  difficulties  does  not  hold 
here.  Philosophical  uncertainties  about 
God  emerge  in  their  effect  upon  Chris¬ 
tian  faith  and  common  living,  and  the 
grounds  of  doubt  that  are  influential  in 
the  house  and  the  shop,  by  the  grave-side 
and  in  the  ruins,  are  among  those  that 
trouble  the  philosophers  also.  Philoso¬ 
phers  are  common  men  here,  and  common 
men  are  philosophers.  The  question  of 
the  being  of  God  is  not  exclusively,  or 
chiefly,  a  question  of  the  schools:  it  is 
a  question  of  the  world.  All  men  have  to 
do  with  it,  and  all  have  means  of  know- 


10 


THE  PRACTICAL  ARGUMENT 


ing  that  the  clear  solution  lies  above  and 
beyond  our  ordinary  range  of  life,  where 
it  can  be  reached  only  through  strenuous 
exertion  of  our  highest  powers. 

What  shall  we  do?  How  shall  we 
advise  the  common  man  who  desires  to 
believe  in  God?  This  is  the  same  as  to 
ask  how  we  shall  advise  ourselves ;  for  we 
are  all  common  men,  dealing  with  the 
common  question.  What  shall  a  man  do, 
who  stands  unsatisfied  with  the  customary 
arguments,  perplexed  by  the  mystery  of 
life,  unable  to  rise  to  a  satisfying  faith, 
and  uncertain  whether  the  words  of  belief 
that  he  longs  to  utter  are  words  of  truth? 
How  shall  such  a  man  approach  his  ques¬ 
tion,  with  rational  hope  of  becoming  able 
to  say  with  all  his  heart  and  all  his  mind, 
“I  believe  in  God  the  Father”? 

I  propose  that  such  a  man  test  the  con¬ 
trary.  Try  the  opposite  position,  and  see 


FOR  THE  BEING  OF  GOD  II 

how  it  works.  What  if  there  absolutely 
is  no  God?  There  are  difficulties,  as  we 
well  know,  in  believing  in  God  the  Father 
Almighty,  Maker  of  heaven  and  earth. 
They  sometimes  seem  so  great  that  it 
would  appear  easier  to  take  the  other  side, 
and  disbelieve  in  God.  But  it  would 
seem  reasonable  to  inquire  what  difficul¬ 
ties  there  are  in  doing  that.  It  is  fair  to 
assume  that  any  conclusion  or  conviction 
in  so  high  and  mysterious  a  region  will 
have  its  difficulties,  but  it  is  well  to  judge 
them  in  advance  as  far  as  we  can,  and  see 
whether,  in  accepting  a  new  conclusion, 
we  shall  be  freeing  ourselves  from  per¬ 
plexity  or  not.  Test  the  contrary.  I 
find  it  hard  to  believe  in  God  with  a  full 
and  satisfactory  belief :  where,  then,  shall  I 
find  myself,  if  I  give  over  the  attempt  and 
adapt  myself  to  the  conclusion  that  God 
cannot  be  believed  in?  If  this  is  really 
the  easier  position  to  hold,  we  wish  to 
know  it ;  but  if  we  were  to  find  ourselves 


12 


THE  PRACTICAL  ARGUMENT 


in  a  land  of  contradictions,  inaptitudes, 
and  impossibilities  that  could  not  sustain 
the  life  of  mind  or  of  heart,  it  would  be 
greatly  to  our  advantage  if  a  glimpse  into 
that  land  could  be  given  to  us  before  we 
really  entered  it.  As  a  common  man, 
therefore,  bringing  the  common  questions, 
I  wish  to  inquire  where  I  am,  and  what  I 
am,  if  I  am  not  to  believe  in  God.  I  am 
driven  before  my  difficulties,  out  of  what 
I  thought  was  God’s  country,  and  I  go  as 
I  am  driven.  Where  am  I  now?  Do  not 
blame  me  for  saying  the  things  that  I 
must  now  say,  for  I  shall  not  be  talking 
foolishness.  I  must  plunge  at  once  into  a 
world  where  God  is  not,  and  report  what 
I  find  there.  And  do  not  plead  against 
me  that  absolute  atheists  are  very  rare,  —  so 
rare,  in  fact,  that  it  is  hardly  worth  while 
to  consider  their  arguments.  I  am  not 
proposing  to  dispute  with  an  absolute 
atheist,  or  indeed  to  dispute  at  all.  I  am 
considering  my  own  questions,  and  those 


FOR  THE  BEING  OF  GOD 


13 


of  my  hearers  in  this  room.  If  we  yield 
to  our  every-day  difficulties  about  the  divine 
intelligence  and  goodness,  and  consent  to 
the  denial  that  they  suggest,  we  shall 
move  into  the  country  of  absolute  atheism, 
even  though  we  prove  to  be  the  first  that 
ever  entered  it.  Either  we  are  to  believe 
in  God,  or  we  are  not;  and  I  am  simply 
proposing  that  we  test  the  negative,  and 
see  whether  it  affords  us  rest  from  our 
mental  and  moral  perplexities. 

If  there  is  no  God,  there  is  no  mind 
where  we  have  been  accustomed  to  look 
for  God.  When  I  yield  to  my  difficulties 
in  believing  in  God,  I  surrender  my  right 
to  hold  that  the  universe,  as  I  have  been 
wont  to  call  it,  ‘is  a  work  of  mind.  If  I 
find  a  mind,  I  find  a  God,  and  I  am  now 
shut  out  from  finding  a  God.  I  live  there¬ 
fore  in  a  mindless  world.  It  has  never 
been  willed  to  be  such  as  it  is,  and  it  has 
never  been  embraced  in  thought.  It  has 


1 4  THE  PR  A  C  TIC  A  L  A  RG  UMENT 


not  become  what  it  is  by  any  exercise  of 
rational  powers.  It  is  not  an  intellectual 
system,  but  is  inexpressive  of  mental  proc¬ 
esses  and  meanings.  I  have  often  found 
it  hard  to  say  that  the  universe  with  all 
its  diverse  elements  is  the  expression  of  a 
mind,  and  therefore  I  now  declare,  whether 
sadly  or  joyfully  does  not  matter,  that  it 
is  not.  I  follow  my  doubts,  and  say  there 
is  no  God,  and  understand  myself  to  be 
saying  that  there  is  no  mind  in  the  world. 
It  is  a  point  on  which  I  cannot  compro¬ 
mise  :  yes  and  no  are  the  only  answers  to 
the  question,  and  my  doubts  have  driven 
me  to  the  no. 

Then  of  course  I  shall  find  no  mind  ex¬ 
pressed  in  things  about  me,  and  shail  hear 
no  living  voice  from  above  me  and  beyond. 
It  is  no  news  to  any  of  us  that  if  there  is 
no  God  there  will  be  nothing  to  bear  the 
name  of  revelation.  Of  course  all  that 
men  have  called  by  that  inspiring  name 
will  disappear  from  the  plane  of  reality, 


FOR  THE  BEING  OF  GOD 


15 


and  nothing  that  can  be  called  revelation 
will  ever  be  known  again.  There  is  no 
one  to  be  revealed;  and  if  I  hunger  and 
thirst  for  knowledge  of  unseen  things, 
there  is  no  one  to  offer  it  to  me.  This  is 
too  old  a  story  to  need  more  than  a  pass¬ 
ing  mention  now.  But  the  companion-fact 
to  this  is  not  so  familiar  in  the  common 
thought.  If  I  follow  my  doubts,  and  de¬ 
scribe  the  observed  universe  in  accordance 
with  them,  it  is  certain,  as  I  said  just 
now,  that  I  shall  find  no  mind  expressed 
in  things  around .  me.  If  there  is  none,  I 
can  find  none.  If  by  any  means  it  comes 
to  pass  that  I  think  I  do  find  traces  of  the 
work  of  mind  in  things  around  me,  that 
will  be  only  because  I  am  unwittingly 
projecting  my  own  powers  into  things 
that  I  observe,  and  finding  there  what  I 
have  first  placed  there  by  my  own  think¬ 
ing.  Any  such  process  will  be  illegitimate, 
and  can  result  only  in  misinterpretation 
and  misconception.  No  imaginings  of 


1 6  THE  PRACTICAL  ARGUMENT 


mine  will  change  the  facts.  A  mindless 
world  it  is,  being  a  godless  world,  and  a 
mindless  world  I  shall  find  it.  No  traces 
of  mind  shall  I  find  in  it,  since  none  are 
there. 

So  I  shall  have  no  science.  I  can  have 
none.  I  find  myself  in  a  world  to  which 
science  is  not  normal;  a  world  that  does 
not  yield  itself  to  science  or  offer  any 
material  for  it;  a  world  in  which  there  is 
nothing  to  make  science  of.  I  may  as 
well  speak  the  simple  word  that  tells  the 
truth:  I  live  in  a  world  where  science  is 
impossible.  It  is  a  world  where  science 
can  never  be  possible. 

I  need  not  stay  long  to  establish  it.  No 
God,  no  revelation,  is  a  truism ;  but  beside 
it  stands  the  equally  certain  and  unques¬ 
tionable  truth,  no  God,  no  science.  Reve¬ 
lation  and  science  stand  on  equal  ground, 
for  the  two  are  essentially  alike.  Revela¬ 
tion  implies  that  there  is  some  Other  than 
myself,  unseen,  who  can  and  does  make 


FOR  THE  BEING  OF  GOD  1 7 

himself  known  to  me.  Science  implies 
that  there  is  some  mind  other  than  myself, 
that  has  expressed  itself  in  things  that 
I  observe,  and  expressed  through  them 
meanings  that  are  fit  material  for  appre¬ 
hension  by  the  human  intellect.  Science 
implies  two  intellects,  —  one  weaving  in¬ 
tellectual  conceptions  into  the  web  of 
existence,  and  the  other  studying  out  the 
figure  that  is  inwoven  to  the  web;  two 
intellects,  one  producing  what  the  other 
can  read  and  understand,  and  the  other 
understanding  what  the  first  has  produced. 

I  suppose  it  is  plain  that  nothing  but  a 
mind  can  apprehend  and  appreciate  the 
expressions  of  a  mind.  The  utterances 
that  I  am  making,  being  expressions  of 
an  intellect,  would  remain  absolutely  un¬ 
absorbed  and  unapprehended,  if  there  were 
not  other  intellects  here  to  which  they 
made  appeal.  But  it  is  equally  plain  and 
true  that  an  intellect  can  apprehend  and 
find  meaning  only  in  that  which  is  the 


1 8  THE  PRACTICAL  ARGUMENT 


expression  of  a  mind,  of  its  own  intel¬ 
lectual  nature  and  kindred.  If  the  sounds 
that  now  traverse  the  air  of  this  room 
did  not  convey  expressions  of  powers 
akin  to  your  own,  they  would  be  to  you 
utterly  unintelligible.  The  cries  of  our 
lower  kindred  among  the  animals  are  to 
us  partly  intelligible,  and  even  impressive, 
but  only  as  we  hear  in  them  the  expression 
of  some  desires  or  passions  that  we  are 
familiar  with.  We  understand  only  where 
there  is  community.  Rational  powers,  as 
we  name  them,  apprehend  only  rational 
expressions.  Only  our  own  kindred  can 
we  understand.  And  so  it  becomes  clear 
that  in  a  world  that  is  not  the  expression 
of  mind  there  can  be  for  us  no  science. 
Nothing  can  be  understood,  for  nothing 
will  have  meaning.  The  one  point  of  con¬ 
tact  with  our  rational  powers,  by  virtue 
of  which  we  might  form  statements  of 
meanings  present  in  things  that  we  ob¬ 
serve,  will  be  forever  wanting.  A  mind- 


FOR  THE  BEING  OF  GOD 


19 


less  world  is  necessarily  an  unintelligible 
world,  and  therefore  no  world  for  science. 
Science  makes  its  exit  along  with  revela¬ 
tion,  if  we  cannot  believe  in  God. 

It  is  a  very  serious  matter  to  live  in  a 
world  where  no  science  is  possible.  I  was 
just  now  asking  where  I  find  myself  if  I 
cannot  believe  in  God,  and  it  seems  that 
I  find  myself  in  a  mindless  world,  where  I 
can  have  no  science.  I  do  not  see  how  I 
can  be  at  home  in  such  a  world,  and  at 
any  rate  I  must  ask  another  question. 
What  am  I,  if  I  cannot  believe  in  God? 
What  am  I,  indeed?  I  have  been  accus¬ 
tomed  to  say  that  I  am  a  spirit,  or  that 
I  have  a  mind,  or  that  I  am  a  rational 
being,  —  describing  myself  under  all  these 
names,  and  perhaps  more,  as  une  who 
possesses»  powers  of  understanding  and 
affection  and  spiritual  activity.  I  have  a 
right  to  describe  myself  thus,  for  these 
powers  are  certainly  an  inalienable  part  of 


1 


20 


THE  PRACTICAL  ARGUMENT 


myself.  Whatever  I  may  conclude  about 
the  existence  of  a  spirit  greater  than  I, 
these  powers  belong  to  me,  and  my  pos¬ 
session  of  them  is  not  less  real,  whether 
I  believe  in  God  or  not.  But  my  own 
being,  though  not  altered  in  itself,  is  rela¬ 
tively  altered  in  a  most  surprising  way, 
by  my  ceasing  to  have  a  God.  I  now 
stand  forth  as  the  greatest  mind  in  exist¬ 
ence,  —  or  rather,  as  a  fair  sample  of  the 
class  of  greatest  existing  minds.  Other 
individual  men  may  have  larger  powers 
than  I,  or  they  may  not;  in  either  case 
there  exists  no  mind,  either  within  my 
knowledge  or  beyond  it,  essentially  supe¬ 
rior  to  mine  in  the  nature  of  its  powers  and 
its  relation  to  existing  things.  If  I  know 
no  God,  I  know  no  mind  superior  to  the 
human  mind,  and  so  no  mind  essentially 
above  my  own.  Human  thought  is  the 
highest  thought,  and  human  knowledge 
the  completest  knowledge,  that  there  is. 
Nothing  more  than  men  know  has  ever 


FOR  THE  BEING  OF  GOD 


21 


been  known  anywhere.  Whether  other 
worlds  exist,  peopled  by  minds  superior  to 
ours,  matters  nothing  here ;  for  if  they  do 
exist  they  are  essentially  like  us  in  the 
nature  and  limitations  of  this  knowledge, 
though  superior.  The  fact  remains,  that 
if  I  know  no  God,  my  mind  stands  forth 
as  a  sample  of  the  highest  type  of  mind 
in  existence. 

A  high  rank  this  would  seem  to  give  to 
man.  There  is  none  above  him.  Yes,  but 
see  what  it  brings  with  it.  No  thought 
in  existence  larger  than  mine:  then  there 
is  no  comprehensive  thought.  My  knowl¬ 
edge  grows,  and  is  dependent  upon  growth 
and  upon  the  passage  of  time.  I  know  a 
little  about  certain  fragments  of  the  past, 
I  know  a  little  of  things  that  are  at  pres¬ 
ent,  I  know  nothing  of  the  future.  My 
own  career,  as  a  whole,  I  have  never 
grasped  in  thought,  and  can  never  grasp. 
I  can  form  no  synthesis,  save  by  guess¬ 
work,  even  of  this  hour  and  the  next. 


22 


THE  PRACTICAL  ARGUMENT 


There  is  no  man  living  who  can  combine 
this  hour  and  the  next  hour  in  his  knowl¬ 
edge.  But  this  is  now  the  largest  knowl¬ 
edge  that  exists.  My  life  as  a  whole  has 
never  been  present  in  thought  to  any  mind, 
and  will  never  be.  No  single  thing  that 
exists  will  ever  be  understood,  in  the  sense 
of  being  truly  known  in  all  its  relations ; 
for  neither  I  nor  any  other  man  can  ever 
fully  know  all  the  qualities  and  relations  of 
anything  whatever.  No  larger  knowledge 
than  this!  Nothing  has  ever  been  thought 
through,  nothing  has  ever  been  fully 
known.  All  is  moving  on  uncompre¬ 
hended.  The  world  itself  has  never  been 
embraced  in  any  thought,  or  held  present 
as  a  whole  to  any  observation  or  any  con¬ 
ceiving  power.  The  universe  is  no  more 
known  than  I  know  it,  save  as  a  few  of 
my  brothers  have  gathered  more  informa¬ 
tion  about  it  than  I  possess.  All  knowl¬ 
edge  is  knowledge  of  results,  obtained  by 
observation;  knowledge  of  causes,  if  there 


FOR  THE  BEING  OF  GOD 


23 


are  such  things,  is  all  merely  inferential, 
never  and  nowhere  original  and  certain. 
Man  is  at  the  summit  if  there  is  no  God: 
yes,  but  what  a  summit!  No  all-embrac¬ 
ing  mind,  no  well-balanced  understanding, 
no  comprehensive  knowledge,  no  knowl¬ 
edge  higher  and  larger  than  that  human 
ignorance  that  we  are  so  profoundly  con¬ 
scious  of!  Nothing  broader  than  our  nar¬ 
rowness,  or  deeper  than  our  little  depth! 
When  I  think  of  it,  I  most  ardently  hope 
that  the  summit  may  be  found  higher  than 
I,  or  any  of  my  kind. 

But  what  if  my  hope  fails,  and  I  am 
compelled  to  live  in  such  a  world  as  I 
have  been  picturing  ?  A  further  question 
will  confront  me,  and  I  cannot  turn  away 
from  it.  It  is  a  question  of  life  and 
death,  too,  for  all  my  thinking.  Can  I 
trust  my  powers  ?  The  powers  of  a  think¬ 
ing  being  I  certainly  possess.  No  one 
knew  that  I  would  possess  them,  but  some- 


24  THE  practical  argument 


how  I  do.  By  some  unexplained  and  in¬ 
explicable  process  I  have  come  to  have 
them,  and  there  are  none  essentially  higher 
anywhere.  Standing  in  the  front  rank 
might  seem  to  imply  the  trustworthiness 
of  these  powers  of  mine;  but  does  it,  or 
does  it  not?  Can  I  trust  my  powers? 

The  trouble  about  trusting  my  powers  in 
a  world  without  God  is  very  easily  stated. 
My  powers  stand  alone.  The  powers  of  all 
my  human  brothers  are  just  like  mine,  and 
I  have  nothing  with  which  to  compare  my 
powers,  except  others  of  the  same  order. 
The  human  has  nothing  to  compare  itself 
with,  for,  since  I  cannot  believe  in  God, 
there  is  no  mind  higher  than  the  human. 
A  dog,  if  he  came  to  a  human-like  con¬ 
sciousness  and  self-estimate,  might  com¬ 
pare  his  reasoning  with  that  of  his  master, 
so  far  as  he  could  understand  it,  and  thus 
learn  to  judge  himself.  But  my  thinking 
stands  by  itself,  with  no  higher  thought  in 
existence.  I  am  like  a  dog  in  a  manless 


FOR  THE  BEING  OF  GOD 


25 


world;  and  how  shall  I  learn  anything 
about  larger  and  more  trustworthy  mental 
action  ?  If  there  were  about  me  a  world  of 
order,  offspring  of  an  intelligent  mind,  with 
its  far-reaching  illustration  of  intellectual 
operations,  such  a  world  would  serve  as  a 
support  to  my  intelligence,  a  confirmation 
to  my  instinctive  confidence  in  my  own 
thinking,  and  a  proof  of  the  validity  of  my 
normal  intellectual  powers  and  processes. 
If  there  were  a  larger  mind  than  mine 
putting  forth  similar  activity,  doing  in  the 
large  what  I  do  in  the  small,  giving  evi¬ 
dence  that  it  possessed  in  full  what  I  pos¬ 
sess  in  rudiments,  plainly  such  a  mind 
would  stand  in  comparison  with  my  own, 
and  I  could  learn  to  estimate  the  value  of 
my  own  processes  in  the  light  of  larger 
processes.  The  vaster  the  scope  of  such 
a  mind,  and  the  larger  and  more  various 
its  operations,  the  surer  would  become  the 
basis  for  an  estimate  of  what  rationality 
is,  and  what  my  own  rationality  is  worth. 


26  THE  PRACTICAL  ARGUMENT 


But  as  it  is,  what  have  I  to  go  by,  in 
judging  the  validity  of  my  own  mental 
processes?  Indeed,  what  do  I  mean  by 
validity  of  mental  processes?  There  are 
no  mental  processes,  except  in  such  limited 
minds  as  my  own,  and  there  exists  abso¬ 
lutely  no  outside  standard  by  which  I,  or 
all  men  together,  can  test  the  correctness 
of  human  thinking.  How  can  I  be  sure 
that  it  is  trustworthy? 

This  sad  sense  of  uncertainty  is  deep¬ 
ened  by  what  I  know  of  the  status  of  the 
mental  operation  in  mankind.  That  status 
is  one  of  incompleteness.  Thinking  is  an 
art  that  needs  to  be  learned,  and  an  art 
that  humanity  has  imagined  itself  to  be 
learning.  At  any  rate,  mankind  has  ap¬ 
parently  begun  to  learn  the  use  of  intel¬ 
lectual  powers,  but  has  thus  far  learned  it 
only  in  part.  My  own  thinking  is  youth¬ 
ful,  tentative,  almost  childish:  I  go  on 
from  year  to  year,  correcting  not  only  my 
conclusions  but  my  methods,  taking  on 


FOR  THE  BEING  OF  GOD 


27 


what  I  feel  to  be  better  and  more  trust¬ 
worthy  ways  of  mental  work.  But  what 
right  have  I  to  feel  that  they  are  better? 
I  am  only  a  beginner  in  intellectual  action, 
at  the  best,  and  all  men  are  like  me  in 
this,  even  though  they  may  be  more  ad¬ 
vanced  beginners  than  I,  and  we  are  all 
beginners  without  a  teacher,  groping  our 
way  through  the  unknown  field  of  mental 
operation,  with  no  tests  or  means  of  com¬ 
parison.  What  we  call  better  may  be 
worse,  —  if  there  be  any  worse  or  better. 
What  we  fancy  to  be  growth  may  be 
decline.  When  we  feel  a  fine  glow  of 
certainty,  our  powers  are  so  childish  and 
our  methods  so  improvable  that,  for  aught 
we  know,  we  may  be  enjoying  merely 
the  intoxication  of  self-confidence  and  the 
delight  of  a  pleasing  error.  Without 
guide  and  without  maturity,  how  shall  we 
be  sure  that  our  thinking  is  worthy  to  be 
trusted  ? 

And  even  deeper  than  this  the  question 


23  THE  PRACTICAL  ARGUMENT 


goes.  As  for  the  very  process  itself  that 
we  call  rational,  and  the  quality  in  our¬ 
selves  to  which  we  give  that  name,  — 
what  are  we  to  think  of  this  quality  and 
this  process  ?  Here  is  a  race  of  beings  to 
which  this  quality  and  process  seem  nor¬ 
mal.  But,  by  hypothesis,  they  stand 
utterly  alone  and  unsupported  in  this 
striking  peculiarity.  No  larger  rationality 
than  theirs  exists,  and  the  world  around 
them,  however  it  may  have  come  into 
being,  bears  no  traces  of  rational  opera¬ 
tion,  and  is  not  the  product  of  a  rational 
mind.  Here  we  stand  thinking,  all  by 
ourselves,  with  nothing  to  bear  us  com¬ 
pany.  How  shall  we  know  that  there  is 
any  real  meaning  or  validity  at  all  in  this 
process  which  we  call  rational  ?  The 
world  exists  without  it.  All  the  age-long 
operations  of  the  universe  go  on  without 
it.  How  do  I  know  that  this  whole 
method  and  work  that  I  call  rational,  is 
not  a  mere  freak  of  life,  a  passing  and 


FOR  THE  BEING  OF  GOD 


29 


non-significant  development,  as  transient 
and  unimportant  as  it  is  solitary  and  un¬ 
supported?  Nay,  rather,  it  looks  to  me 
as  if  the  rational  process,  thus  unsup¬ 
ported  and  alone,  could  be  nothing  else 
than  a  passing  freak  of  mindless  operation. 
I  certainly  cannot  be  sure  that  it  is  more 
than  this,  and  while  such  uncertainty  lasts, 
I  must  not  allow  myself  to  trust  my  rational 
processes,  as  if  they  possessed  a  genuine 
validity.  My  powers  may  in  every  act  be 
misleading  me,  my  thinking  is  a  will  o’ 
the  wisp,  and  life  is  false.  There  is  a 
noble  phrase  that  I  am  very  fond  of,  — 
“an  honest  world.”  But  that  phrase,  and 
the  idea  that  it  expresses,  and  the  whole 
range  of  conceptions  to  which  it  belongs, 
can  have  no  existence  if  we  are  forbidden 
by  the  facts  to  believe  in  God.  In  that 
case  our  powers  delude  us  and  lead  us 
into  ways  where  there  is  no  valid  and 
trustworthy  action  possible,  and  the  whole 
order  of  things  amid  which  we  stand  is 


30  THE  PRACTICAL  ARGUMENT 


really  no  order  at  all,  but  a  strange, 
misleading  group  of  accidents,  false  in 
their  testimony  and  untrustworthy  in  their 
nature. 

If  we  were  compelled  to  live  even  for 
a  little  while,  in  such  a  world  as  I  have 
been  speaking  of,  we  should  come  back 
with  unspeakable  joy,  if  the  way  of  return 
were  opened,  into  the  good  old  world  of 
science,  with  its  warm  and  fruitful  soil  of 
intelligibility,  bearing  witness  to  the  pres¬ 
ence  of  the  rich  subsoil  of  mind.  The  world 
of  science  is  the  world  that  can  be  under¬ 
stood  :  that  is  its  great  and  abiding  peculi¬ 
arity.  That  unintelligible  world  of  which 
I  have  just  been  speaking  is  not  the  world 
in  which  we  live.  We  firmly  believe  that 
the  things  around  us  will  give  clear  and 
true  answer  to  our  inquiry  as  to  their 
nature  and  significance.  That  things 
around  us  have  an  intelligible  nature  and 
a  real  significance,  —  that  existing  things 


FOR  THE  BEING  OF  GOD 


31 


have  real  meanings,  —  this  is  the  first 
assumption  of  science.  It  is  an  assump¬ 
tion  that  science  has  never  been  challenged 
by  any  fact  to  abandon ;  rather  has  it  been 
confirmed  by  every  new  discovery  and 
every  fresh  experiment.  The  one  great 
fact  that  modern  science  has  taught  us 
is,  that  the  universe  is  infinitely  richer 
in  meaning  than  we  had  ever  imagined. 
Materialism  in  the  philosophy  of  existence 
is  dead  and  gone.  Brute  force  and  dead 
matter  are  no  longer  spoken  of,  and  the 
physical  universe  is  suspected  to  be  even 
more  truly  a  psychical  universe.  Meaning 
is  everywhere.  But  meaning  and  mind  are 
inseparable.  Thought  is  the  product  of  a 
thinker.  A  system  impressed  throughout 
with  intelligible  meanings  is  the  work  of  a 
mind  that  means.  Perhaps  I  seemed  a 
little  while  ago  to  be  wasting  time  when  I 
talked  of  a  world  in  which  there  could  be 
no  science,  for  there  is  110  such  world. 
We  know  full  well  that  there  is  no  such 


32  THE  PRACTICAL  ARGUMENT 


world.  All  worlds  would  make  good 
homes  for  science,  for  all  worlds  can  be 
understood.  The  universal  method  is  es¬ 
sentially  intelligible ;  the  universal  method 
is  therefore  the  expression  of  mind,  and 
of  mind  similar  to  our  own.  The  good 
old  world  of  science  does  have  the  warm 
and  fertile  soil  of  intelligibility,  and  the 
rich  subsoil  of  mind  does  underlie  it. 
We  men  are  not  the  only  thinkers  in 
existence:  there  is  a  vaster  mind.  Sci¬ 
ence  is  our  witness  that  the  universe  has 
been  embraced  in  a  single  thought.  It  is 
one,  and  not  a  mass  of  fragments.  It  has 
been  thought  through,  and  the  relation 
of  each  part  of  it  to  the  other  parts  has 
been  thought  of.  And  so  we  live  amidst 
rational  operation,  and  there  is  something 
with  which  to  compare  our  mental  proc¬ 
esses.  We  can  judge  of  the  validity  of 
our  reasoning.  Our  minds  and  their  proc¬ 
esses  are  supported  by  the  universal  mind. 
We  are  rational  in  a  rational  universe, 


FOR  THh  BklNL  OF  GOD 


33 


seeking  truth  in  an  honest  world,  children 
thinking  out  the  thoughts  of  the  vast 
mind  to  which  all  things  owe  their  intelli¬ 
gibility.  The  world  is  honest,  and  life  is 
not  a  delusion. 

So  it  appears  that  unless  we  hold  to  the 
universal  mind,  we  are  compelled  to  deny 
the  possibility  of  science,  the  validity  of 
our  own  mental  processes,  and  the  value 
of  all  in  ourselves  that  we  call  rational. 
If  the  universe  is  mindless,  mind  in  us  is 
untrustworthy.  But  since  the  universe  is 
intelligible,  we  may  still  our  doubts  about 
God,  for  atheism  is  impossible,  and  our 
doubts  are  destined  to  be  permanently 
silenced  by  better  knowledge  of  things  as 
they  are. 

Yet  this  may  seem  too  large  a  conclu¬ 
sion.  Another  vast  question  awaits  us. 
Intelligible  che  universe  doubtless  is,  on 
the  intellectual  side:  science  can  see  its 
way  to  exhaustive  knowledge,  if  only 


34  THE  practical  argument 


the  necessary  data  could  be  obtained. 
But  is  the  universe  morally  intelligible? 
There  is  a  universal  mind,  but  is  there  a 
universal  heart?  God  is  intelligence,  but 
is  God  the  perfect  goodness  ?  Intellectual 
doubts  concerning  God  are,  after  all, 
minor  doubts,  and  less  tormenting  than 
those  moral  doubts  that  darken  all  our 
sky  when  they  sweep  across.  There  is 
an  all-comprehending  mind,  that  gives  to 
existence  an  intellectual  unity:  is  there 
also  an  all-comprehending  character  of 
goodness,  that  gives  to  existence  a  moral 
unity?  Belief  that  God  is  good  is  often 
found  the  hardest  part  of  belief  in  God. 

One  true  and  helpful  statement  is  wait¬ 
ing  for  us  here,  suggested  by  the  field  that 
we  have  just  traversed.  Science  brings  us 
a  strong  argument  for  the  goodness  of  God. 
The  existence  of  science,  as  we  have  seen, 
is  evidence  of  the  honesty  of  the  world, 
and  so  of  the  straightforwardness  and  sin¬ 
cerity  of  the  mind  of  which  the  world  is 


FOR  THE  BEING  OF  GOD 


35 


an  expression.  Our  powers,  as  science 
shows  us,  are  not  misleading.  The  ra¬ 
tional  is  the  real.  The  universe  is  framed 
according  to  the  principles  that  our  rational 
nature  acts  upon  and  approves  as  good. 
The  mind  to  which  we  are  akin  has  placed 
us  here  amid  the  manifestations  of  itself, 
where  our  rationality  will  be  supported  by 
its  larger  rationality,  and  be  able  to  find 
confirmation  and  training  in  the  reasoned 
and  reasonable  world.  Our  mental  powers 
have  their  counterparts,  and  what  is  nor¬ 
mal  to  us  proves  to  be  characteristic  of 
existence  around  us.  All  this  is  favorable 
to  belief  in  God  as  good.  Certainly  it 
looks  as  if  the  mind  that  has  given  char¬ 
acter  to  existing  things  were  not  only 
honest  and  trustworthy,  but  benignant  and 
benevolent,  gracious  and  kindly,  worthy 
of  our  love  and  confidence. 

But  when  we  ask  whether  God  is  good, 
we  shall  do  well  to  test  the  matter  here 


36  THE  PRACTICAL  ARGUMENT 


in  the  same  manner  as  before.  Try  the 
opposite.  See  what  comes  if  we  deny 
it,  and  judge  whether  denial  does  not  in¬ 
volve  greater  difficulties  than  it  leads  us 
to  escape. 

I  think  we  may  safely  say  that  we  have 
found  the  acknowledgment  of  a  mind  in 
the  things  around  us  to  he  unavoidable. 
Our  question  now  is,  whether  this  mind, 
whom  we  name  God,  is  good.  We  need 
not  insist  upon  close  definition  of  this 
word  “  good,  ’  ’  for  in  the  large  we  all  know 
well  enough  what  it  means.  Is  the  great 
mind  trustworthy  and  loveworthy?  Does 
God  possess  those  qualities  which  com¬ 
mand  the  approval  of  the  best  human 
judgment  and  affection?  Is  all  that  is 
good  in  us  akin  to  something  greater  and 
better  in  him  ? 

What  if  not?  Let  me  yield  to  my 
doubts  concerning  an  eternal  and  perfect 
goodness,  and  he  driven  to  the  convic¬ 
tion  that  God  is  not  good.  What 


FOR  THE  BEING  OF  GOD 


3/ 


then  ?  Where  am  I,  and  what  am  I, 
now? 

For  one  thing,  I  am  in  a  world  where 
there  ought  to  be  no  religion.  I  do  not 
know  that  I  can  say  that  I  am  in  a  world 
where  there  can  be  no  religion,  for  no  one 
knows  what  follies  may  spring  up  in  an 
irrational  place,  even  though  men  regard 
themselves  as  rational.  But  certainly  in 
a  world  of  rational  men,  where  there  is 
no  God,  there  ought  to  be  no  religion. 
Religion  would  not  be  normal  in  such  a 
world.  It  is  not  well  that  men  should 
look  up,  if  there  is  not  some  one  above 
who  is  worthy  to  be  looked  up  to.  In 
that  case  religion  is  a  delusion  and  a 
snare.  It  would  be  an  unworthy  exercise 
of  high  and  noble  powers.  If  there  is  no 
good  Being,  religion  as  religion  is  a  mis¬ 
take.  It  is  not  merely  true  that  special 
forms  of  religion  are  degrading;  it  is  true 
also  that  this  entire  department  of  human 
nature  and  life  does  not  accord  with  real- 


38  THE  PRACTICAL  ARGUMENT 


ity,  since  there  is  no  worthy  object  for  it 
to  rest  in,  and  man  is  not  himself  till  he 
has  shaken  off  the  whole  system  and  idea 
of  religion,  whether  in  its  lowest  forms  or 
in  its  highest.  Nay,  in  its  highest  forms 
it  is  more  misleading  and  harmful  than  in 
its  lowest,  since  here  its  affirmations  are 
at  once  more  noble  and  more  false. 

A  world  without  God  as  mind  is  a 
world  in  which  science  is  impossible.  A 
world  without  God  as  goodness  is  a  world 
in  which  religion  is  abnormal.  To  live  in 
such  a  world  I  need  not  only  to  throw 
away  all  regard  for  science,  hut  to  still  all 
voices  of  what  I  have  been  wont  to  call 
my  religious  nature.  I  must  not  worship, 
I  must  not  pray,  I  must  not  aspire  to  a 
divine  fellowship,  I  must  not  cry  out  for 
righteousness  in  the  fierceness  of  hunger 
and  thirst,  I  must  not  count  upon  mani¬ 
festations  of  the  divine  goodness  in  my 
own  soul  or  in  the  history  of  my  kind. 
There  is  no  divine  righteousness,  and  there 


FOR  THE  BEING  OF  GOD 


39 


is  no  divine  fellowship.  Let  us  face  the 
consequences  of  our  denial,  for  they  will 
surely  face  us.  Humanity  is  not  adapted 
to  religion,  or  religion  to  humanity.  All 
religion  is  a  mistake.  Religion  of  every 
kind  is  as  much  out  of  place  in  a  godless 
world  as  science  is.  No  longer  has  either 
of  the  two  the  slightest  standing  in  the 
court  of  reality. 

If  I  find  myself  in  a  world  where  relig¬ 
ion  is  utterly  abnormal,  it  will  not  be  long 
before  I  shall  be  asking  what  I  am.  I 
thought  I  had  a  religious  nature;  that  is 
to  say,  I  thought  that  religion  was  normal 
to  me,  and  I  could  not  be  myself  without 
it.  I  thought  these  unquestionably  real 
and  urgent  religious  elements  in  my  life 
and  that  of  mankind  constituted  a  part  of 
my  proper  being.  They  form  a  part  of  my 
actual  being:  there  is  no  doubt  of  that; 
but  it  now  appears  that  my  actual  being 
has  nothing  to  correspond  to  it.  It  is 
exactly  as  if  I  had  eyes  in  a  world  without 


THE  PRACTICAL  ARGUMENT 


light,  ears  in  a  world  of  eternal  silence, 
and  smell  in  a  world  destitute  of  odors. 
It  is  as  if  I  had  reason  in  a  world  non- 
rational,  and  an  artistic  sense  in  a  world 
in  which  beauty  had  never  existed.  Still 
farther,  I  have  to  deal  with  this  enormous 
anomaly,  that  these  powers  that  have  no 
counterpart  have  somehow  been  brought 
into  exercise.  It  is  as  if  in  a  lightless 
world  my  eyes  had  not  been  useless,  as 
if  in  a  silent  world  I  had  been  hearing 
sounds,  as  if  in  a  world  devoid  of  beauty 
my  artistic  sense  had  actually  discovered 
beauty.  For  the  life  of  religion  has  not 
been  void  and  vain.  The  religious  powers 
of  man  have  found  fruitful  exercise,  and 
have  made  their  worthy  and  elevating  con¬ 
tribution  to  the  life  of  the  race;  and  yet 
they  tell  us  what  is  false,  for  there  is  abso¬ 
lutely  no  goodness  above  us.  Passing  by 
the  question  where  these  beneficent  but 
false  endowments  came  from,  and  how  my 
nature  came  thus  to  bear  witness  to  that 


FOR  THE  BEING  OF  GOD 


41 


which  has  no  existence,  I  come  back  to 
my  first  question,  What  am  I  ?  How  can 
I  answer  it?  for  it  is  a  hopeless  puzzle. 
There  are  difficulties,  in  view  of  what  goes 
on  in  this  poor  world,  in  believing  in  the 
goodness  of  God;  but  they  do  not  go  so 
deep  as  this  difficulty  about  the  nature 
and  constitution  of  our  own  selves,  which 
we  meet  if  once  we  follow  our  doubts  and 
deny  that  God  is  good. 

But  the  difficulties  are  not  all  in  the 
region  that  is  commonly  called  religious. 
The  ethical  department  of  life  is  equally 
involved.  I  am  following  my  doubts,  and 
consenting  to  deny  that  God  is  good,  just 
as  I  consented  a  little  while  ago  to  deny 
that  God  is  intelligent.  Then  at  once  I 
encounter  certain  questions  about  this 
reality,  not  well  definable  but  well  under¬ 
stood  in  fact,  which  we  call  goodness. 
To  deny  that  God  has  it  is  not  to  deny 
that  it  exists,  and  is  not  to  get  away  from 


42  THE  PRACTICAL  ARGUMENT 


the  necessity  of  considering  it.  Such  a 
thing  as  goodness  does  exist  among  men. 
We  have  our  moral  judgment,  our  moral 
standards,  our  practice  and  our  theories 
explaining  it,  our  right  and  wrong,  our 
self-condemnation  and  self-approval.  We 
admire  moral  purity,  unselfishness,  fidelity, 
and  love.  We  know  that  goodness  is  real 
in  the  world.  It  is  imperfect  everywhere, 
but  it  is  not  a  dream  or  a  fancy,  it  is  a 
solid  trait  of  existing  character  in  men. 
Mankind  is  evil  enough,  and  prone  enough 
to  evil-doing;  and  yet  goodness,  partial 
but  genuine,  is  as  real  in  the  world  as 
badness,  and  forms  the  great  common 
stock  of  social  possibility,  without  which 
all  our  structures  of  society  could  not  stand 
a  day.  Whether  there  is  a  good  God  or 
not,  good  men  and  women  are  known  to 
us  all,  and  all  human  beings  have  some 
good  in  them. 

But,  following  my  doubts,  I  stand  in  a 
world  that  has  no  good  God  in  it  or 


FOR  THE  BEING  OF  GOD 


43 


above.  All  the  goodness  that  anywhere 
exists  is  like  my  own.  How  much  does 
it  amount  to  ?  Many  of  my  brothers 
in  humanity  may  have  attained  to  a 
higher  degree  of  goodness  than  I  have 
reached,  but  their  goodness  is  of  the  same 
kind  as  mine.  It  belongs  to  the  common 
stock  of  humanity.  It  has  been  attained. 
It  has  been  wrested  from  ancient  brutal- 
ism  and  later  indifference,  through  the 
hard  stress  of  life.  Some  have  supposed 
that  in  part  it  was  taught  from  above,  and 
favored  and  nourished  by  heavenly  gift, 
but  it  was  not:  they  are  wrong;  it  is 
exclusively  human.  It  is  such  as  human 
effort  and  experience  have  attained,  and 
it  is  nothing  more.  I  have  my  little 
part  in  it,  and  I  long  for  a  better  portion. 
I  have  my  conscience  by  which  I  esti¬ 
mate  myself  and  my  doings,  and  I  have 
my  moral  standards,  such  as  I  have 
wrought  out  from  my  inheritance  and  my 
striving;  and  I  have  —  best  gift,  I  used 


44  THE  practical  argument 


to  think,  of  all  that  make  my  manhood 
—  my  love  for  moral  excellence,  and  my 
eager  and  insatiable  desire  to  be  a  better 
man.  If  I  can  attain  to  a  higher  degree 
and  quality  of  goodness,  this  will  be  to 
me  the  very  crown  of  my  life.  Yet  the 
way  of  such  attainment  is  not  very  clear 
to  me.  My  conception  of  moral  excel¬ 
lence  is  not  as  clear  and  worthy  as  I  could 
wish,  my  standards  of  judgment  are  not 
what  they  might  be,  and  my  consistent 
devotion  to  the  ends  of  goodness  is  far 
less  than  I  would  have  it.  I  often  disap¬ 
point  myself,  and  often  wonder  how  I  am 
ever  to  satisfy  even  such  aspirations  as  I 
possess.  This  is  my  status.  It  is  not 
very  satisfactory,  but  I  have  been  hoping 
that  I  might  rise  to  higher  things. 

My  denial  of  goodness  in  God  teaches 
me  a  lesson.  It  teaches  me,  all  in  a  flash 
of  light,  that  such  goodness  as  mine  is  the 
highest  goodness  that  exists.  Other  men 
may  have  more  of  it  than  I,  and  beings  in 


FOR  THE  BEING  OF  GOD 


45 


Mars  or  some  dark  orb  near  Sirius  may 
have  distanced  us  all  in  attainment,  but 
the  only  goodness  that  exists  is  just  such 
developed  and  developing  goodness  as  I 
find  in  myself  and  my  race.  It  is  such  as 
men  have  attained  to.  It  has  no  source, 
except  the  struggles  of  humanity.  It  has 
no  affinity  with  any  dominant  type  of 
being.  It  has  no  standard  above  man¬ 
kind.  There  is  no  standard  to  which 
human  goodness  is  naturally  destined  to 
be  conformed.  It  has  no  friend  above,  no 
inspirer  and  inbreather,  no  higher  end  or 
aim.  I  may  not  be  the  best  of  men,  but 
all  the  goodness  that  anywhere  exists  or 
ever  will  exist  is  of  the  same  type  as 
mine.  I  may  consult  with  students  more 
advanced,  but  this  school  has  no  teacher, 
no  standards,  and  no  ideals.  The  idea  of 
comparing  my  conduct  with  a  perfect 
standard,  blaming  me  for  my  failures,  and 
cheering  me  on  toward  higher  attainments, 
never  occurred  to  any  one  above  myself. 


4 6  THE  PRACTICAL  ARGUMENT 


My  efforts  are  unaided  from  above,  unseen 
from  above,  for  the  heavens  are  bare  and 
vacant  of  goodness,  and  there  is  no  higher 
goodness  for  me  to  rise  into.  I  am  ap¬ 
palled  at  learning  that  the  highest  good¬ 
ness  is  so  low,  and  as  for  encourage¬ 
ment  to  rise  above  myself,  where  can  I 
find  it? 

But  the  same  question  rises  about  good¬ 
ness  unsupported,  that  we  met  concerning 
unsupported  rational  powers.  What  is 
the  rank  and  value  of  a  goodness  that  has 
no  support  in  the  general  order  of  things  ? 
These  sensations  of  right  and  wrong,  these 
estimates  of  good  and  evil,  these  horrors 
at  sin  and  hungerings  and  thirstings  after 
righteousness,  —  they  are  found  to  have  no 
existence,  affiliations,  or  affinities  except 
in  the  thoughts  of  men.  They  cannot  be 
tested  by  comparison  with  any  external  au¬ 
thority.  The  order  of  human  events  goes 
on  without  reference  to  them.  The  mind 
that  has  thought  all  things  —  for  we  must 


FOR  THE  BEING  OF  GOD 


4  7 


admit  the  presence  and  action  of  such  a 
mind,  or  stultify  ourselves  and  all  our 
thinking  —  has  no  sympathy  with  them. 
The  mind  that  has  determined  what  should 
be  has  made  its  determination  without 
reference  to  any  of  these  considerations. 
On  what  ground  can  I  base  the  least  confi¬ 
dence  in  my  moral  judgment,  as  I  call  it, 
when  it  stands  thus  unsupported  and 
alone?  Moral  judgment  is  an  exception 
in  the  world.  There  is  no  reason  to  sup¬ 
pose  that  it  was  ever  intended  by  a  mind 
that  had  sympathy  with  moral  thinking  or 
approval  of  what  we  call  moral  excellence. 
Most  probably  this  whole  realm  of  thought 
about  morals  represents  only  a  feverish 
state  of  ill-developed  and  incompetent 
humanity.  If  the  great  mind  can  get  on 
without  goodness,  surely  we  little  minds 
may  do  the  same,  and  so  we  may  as  well 
forget  the  whole  matter,  as  a  hopeless 
puzzle  from  one  point  of  view,  and  a  vain 
delusion  from  another.  We  cannot  trust 


48  THE  PRACTICAL  ARGUMENT 


our  moral  judgment  or  our  moral  sense. 
Our  nature  deceives  us,  and  life  is  false. 
If  God  is  not  good,  we  cannot  be  sure  of 
anything. 

Many  men  allow  their  doubts  about  the 
being  of  God  to  gain  power  over  them, 
without  stopping  to  notice  whither  such 
doubts  would  lead  them.  Doubt  may  be 
blameless,  and  a  doubter  the  most  sincere 
of  men,  helpless,  indeed,  in  yielding  to 
what  seems  to  him  beyond  escape.  Never¬ 
theless,  it  is  wise  to  consider  the  whither. 
Is  it  easier  to  deny  the  being  of  God  than 
to  accept  it?  Do  we  leave  our  perplexi¬ 
ties  behind  us  when  we  yield  to  the  diffi¬ 
culties  that  beset  our  theism?  The  truth 
is,  that  to  deny  the  presence  of  mind  in 
the  universe  about  us,  is  to  discredit  all 
mind  and  all  work  of  mind  in  ourselves, 
and  to  render  our  own  thinking  untrust¬ 
worthy  throughout;  and  that  to  deny  the 
presence  of  goodness  in  the  mind  that  we 


FOR  THE  BEING  OF  GOD 


49 


are  thus  led  to  recognize,  is  to  destroy  the 
basis  of  all  religion  for  mankind,  to  dis¬ 
credit  the  reality  and  worth  of  all  good¬ 
ness  in  men,  and  to  declare  our  own  moral 
judgments  unworthy  of  confidence.  When 
the  facts  stand  thus,  the  acceptance  of 
belief  in  God  involves  far  less  difficulty 
than  the  denial  of  it.  The  being  of  God 
is  the  indispensable  support  for  our  con¬ 
fidence  in  human  thinking,  and  the  only 
key  to  the  understanding  of  religion  and 
the  human  conscience. 

* 

The  practical  argument  that  I  have  thus 
ventured  to  present  to  you  is  more  power¬ 
ful  to-day  than  it  ever  has  been  before. 
The  view  of  existence  that  is  now  current 
requires  belief  in  God,  and  strongly  rein¬ 
forces  it.  The  present  view  of  existence 
is  the  evolutionary  view ;  and  no  view  of 
the  existing  universe  ever  represented  it, 
as  the  expression  of  mind,  so  fully  as  does 
the  evolutionary  view.  For  the  sake  of 


4 


50  THE  PRACTICAL  ARGUMENT 


my  argument  I  was  willing,  a  little  while 
ago,  to  appear  foolish  while  I  talked  of  a 
world  in  which  science  was  impossible. 
Such  would  indeed  be  the  world  that  had 
no  mind  in  it;  but  I  well  knew  how  fool¬ 
ish  it  seems  to  speak  as  if  the  world  in 
which  we  live  were  such  a  world.  The  doc¬ 
trine  of  evolution  declares  the  unity  and 
continuity  of  things,  and  thus  proclaims 
that  the  field  of  science  is  universal.  It 
now  stands  unquestionable  that  the  field  of 
intelligibility  knows  no  limits.  All  things 
are  subject  to  the  operation  of  one  method, 
which  is  intelligible  to  us.  The  range  of 
investigation  is  boundless,  and  our  abili¬ 
ties  are  limited  through  ignorance,  and 
through  lack  of  data  and  means  of  search¬ 
ing;  hut  the  doctrine  of  evolution  places 
the  difficulties  all  in  us,  and  declares  that 
the  same  rational  method  that  we  have 
observed  wherever  we  could  inquire  is7 
prevalent  everywhere,  so  that  if  we  could 
search  all  existing  things  we  could  under- 


FOR  THE  BEING  OF  GOD 


51 


stand  them.  But  if  man  can  understand 
the  universe  in  its  long  unfolding,  it  is 
because  the  universe  in  its  long  unfold¬ 
ing  expresses  the  thoughts  of  a  rational 
mind  that  is  akin  to  the  mind  of  man  that 
understands  it.  By  the  doctrine  of  evo¬ 
lution,  the  universe  is  for  the  first  time 
consistently  represented  as  a  universe  of 
ideas,  —  that  is  to  say,  as  an  expression  of 
God.  From  of  old,  Christian  faith  and 
doctrine  have  declared  it  to  be  so;  but 
now  comes  the  doctrine  of  evolution,  to 
illustrate  and  confirm  the  declaration,  so 
that  it  cannot  be  denied  again.  To  deny 
the  presence  of  mind  in  the  universe 
is  to  be  belated  in  the  world  of  evolu¬ 
tionary  thought.  If  the  common  man 
comes  to  a  true  conception  of  the  world 
he  lives  in,  he  will  find  the  day  far 
past  when  he  could  question  the  presence 
and  activity  of  the  all-comprehending 
mind. 

Not  less  strongly,  though  in  a  different 


52 


THE  PRACTICAL  ARGUMENT 


way,  does  the  doctrine  of  evolution  rein¬ 
force  our  belief  in  the  goodness  of  God. 
A  system  of  evolution  is  a  system  of  un¬ 
folding  of  ideas,  and  is  a  system  concern¬ 
ing  which  we  may  be  sure  that  it  has  been 
thought  of  and  thought  through.  Not  at 
random  does  it  move,  but  in  accordance 
with  certain  ideals  that  manifest  an  ascend¬ 
ing  significance  as  the  process  advances. 
According  to  all  analogy  that  we  know, 
these  ideals  must  have  been  present  to 
the  mind  that  organized  and  sustains  the 
process.  As  the  movement  sweeps  on,  it 
is  found  to  be  ever  more  and  more  expres¬ 
sive  of  the  qualities  of  a  being  capable  of 
conducting  such  a  process.  Life,  con¬ 
sciousness,  reason,  far-reaching  intellect, 
—  these  form  an  ascending  movement,  ris¬ 
ing  toward  resemblance  to  the  original 
conceiving  mind ;  and  we  never  doubt  that 
these  qualities,  slowly  brought  forth  in 
the  world,  are  qualities  of  the  mind  by 
which  the  entire  process  has  been  thought 


FOR  THE  BEING  OF  GOD 


53 


through.  But  to  these  is  added  goodness. 
Goodness,  moral  worthiness,  grows  up  in 
men.  It  is  a  quality  without  which  all 
the  other  traits  and  attributes  of  humanity 
are  incomplete  and  unsatisfactory.  Life, 
consciousness,  reason,  far-reaching  and 
mighty  intellect,  without  moral  excellence, 
leave  man  hut  an  unfinished  being,  and 
defective  in  the  highest  region  of  his 
nature.  Goodness  is  the  crown  of  human¬ 
ity,  the  indispensable  final  element  in  the 
making  of  completed  men.  This  highest 
quality  is  slowly  coming  in  to  the  human 
race,  as  intellect  slowly  came  in  before  it; 
and  the  analogy  of  all  preceding  gains  of 
man  convinces  us  that  it  is  coming  in  as 
yet  another  form  of  resemblance  to  that 
great  mind  which  is  bringing  forth  its 
own  likeness  from  the  long  process  of  the 
universe.  Mind  has  been  developed  in 
man  through  dealings  with  a  world  that  is 
the  manifold  and  helpful  expression  of 
mind.  Mind  in  man  has  grown  up  in 


54  THE  practical  argument 


response  to  the  presence  of  mind  in  God. 
So  goodness  in  man  is  growing  up  in 
response  to  the  eternal  reality  of  goodness 
in  God.  Human  mind  is  supported  in  its 
processes  by  the  sustaining  reality  of  divine 
mind;  and  human  goodness  is  supported 
in  like  manner  by  the  eternal  reality  of 
divine  goodness.  Both  virtue  and  relig¬ 
ion  are  responses  to  the  eternal  goodness, 
and  would  be  unsupported  and  misleading 
experiences,  telling  man  falsehood,  and 
luring  him  by  false  ideals,  unless  an  eter¬ 
nal  divine  goodness,  source  of  the  like  in 
man,  were  existent  in  God.  To  deny 
the  divine  goodness,  original,  perfect,  and 
eternal,  is  to  miss  the  point  of  the  evolu¬ 
tionary  process,  and  leave  it  as  puzzling 
as  a  mindless  world.  If  the  common  man 
comes  rightly  to  know  the  world  he  lives 
in,  he  will  feel  the  sense  of  the  eternal 
goodness  sweeping  in  upon  him  as  a  very 
flood  of  inspiration.  His  own  childish 
attempts  at  goodness  he  will  find  sup- 


FOR  THE  BEING  OF  GOD 


55 


ported  and  sustained  by  that  which  con¬ 
stitutes  the  universal  order,  and  he  will 
hear  the  call  of  existence,  summoning  him 
onward  and  upward,  into  the  moral  like¬ 
ness  of  God. 


. 


.  . 


. 

■ 


II 

DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


II 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 

The  present  purpose  requires  the  resum¬ 
ing  and  re-presenting  of  the  conclusions  of 
the  first  lecture.  Influenced  by  the  dif¬ 
ficulties  that  we  find  in  believing  in  God, 
we  inquired  what  difficulties  there  are  in 
denying  God  and  getting  on  without 
admission  of  his  existence.  On  the  intel 
lectual  side,  the  conclusion  was  that  we 
cannot  deny  the  presence  of  a  mind  in  the 
universe  without  vitiating  our  own  men¬ 
tal  processes  and  casting  doubt  upon  the 
validity  of  all  our  thinking.  Since  the 
evolutionary  method  was  discerned,  daily 
has  the  evidence  been  accumulating  that 
the  universe  has  been  thought  through. 
If  it  has  not  been  thought  through,  then 
there  exists  no  essentially  higher  thinking 


6o 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


than  ours,  and  our  thinking  cannot  be 
shown  to  be  worthy  of  confidence.  On 
the  moral  side,  the  conclusion  was  that 
we  cannot  deny  goodness  to  the  mind  that 
we  thus  acknowledge  as  existing,  without 
declaring  the  entire  field  of  religion  void, 
and  discrediting  all  our  own  moral  con¬ 
victions.  If  that  mind  is  not  good,  there 
exists  no  goodness  essentially  higher  than 
ours,  and  we  do  not  know  that  the  moral 
distinction  and  the  moral  sense  have  any 
genuine  validity.  In  other  words,  our 
mental  and  moral  life,  and  all  religion  too, 
are  unsupported  and  untrustworthy,  unless 
they  correspond  to  a  mental  and  moral  life 
outside  of  ourselves,  in  the  source  from 
which  we  and  all  things  proceed.  Science 
on  the  one  hand,  and  ethics  and  religion 
on  the  other,  which  are  solid  realities  in 
our  life,  absolutely  require  and  imply  in¬ 
telligence  and  goodness  in  the  universal 
order,  and  in  the  mind  which  is  its  source. 
Stronger  than  ever  is  this  argument,  I 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


6i 


claimed,  in  this  age  of  evolutionary 
thought. 

For  myself,  I  have  no  doubt  of  these 
positions,  and  I  judge  that  they  ought  to 
stand  clear  and  firm  in  all  intelligent 
minds  to-day.  The  possibility  of  contra¬ 
dicting  them  is  daily  passing  out  of  the 
world,  and  the  certainty  of  the  all-embrac¬ 
ing  mind  and  the  all-embracing  goodness 
is  destined  soon  to  be  recognized  in  evolu¬ 
tionary  philosophy,  as  it  now  is  in  Chris¬ 
tian  faith. 

Notice  what  this  means.  Since  science 
and  religion  are  possible,  the  great  under¬ 
lying  Power  has  intelligence  and  char¬ 
acter.  That  Power  is  capable  of  thought 
and  of  goodness.  Intelligence  and  char¬ 
acter,  thought  and  goodness,  belong,  so 
far  as  we  know,  only  to  persons.  They 
exist  in  rudimentary  form  and  degree  in 
lower  animals,  but  that  is  only  to  say  that 
they  exist  rudimentally  where  personality 
is  rudimentally  present.  Intelligence  and 


62 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


character  are  personal  endowments,  and 
exist  in  proportion  to  the  completeness  of 
personality.  In  finding  that  there  is  a 
mind  in  the  universe,  and  that  that  mind 
is  good,  we  have  at  least  gone  far  toward 
affirming  that  God  is  personal.  We  have 
attributed  to  him  powers  and  qualities 
that  we  do  not  know  except  in  persons, 
and  it  would  seem  natural  for  us  to  add 
“ God  is  a  person,”  as  our  next  great  affir¬ 
mation.  We  are  now  to  inquire  whether 
this  is  so.  Ought  we  to  say,  and  can  we 
say,  that  God  is  a  personal  Being?  or  are 
we  shut  out  from  saying  so  ? 

Those  of  us  who  were  brought  up  under 
the  influence  of  the  Bible,  handled  in  the 
fashion  of  all  the  Christian  ages,  began 
with  no  difficulty  in  thinking  of  God  as 
personal.  He  was  presented  to  us  in  such 
ways  that  it  was  quite  impossible  to  think 
of  him  in  any  other  manner.  There  was 
no  apology  for  anthropomorphism ;  indeed, 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


63 


there  was  no  recognition  of  it,  as  a  thing 
that  needed  a  name.  That  God  should 
walk  in  the  garden  in  the  cool  of  the  day 
seemed  as  natural  as  that  Adam  should  do 
the  same;  and  that  God  should  talk  with 
Moses  was  no  more  strange,  though  far 
more  solemn  and  impressive,  than  that 
Moses  should  talk  with  Joshua.  “Thus 
saith  the  Lord,”  said  the  prophets.  “I 
am  thy  God,”  said  he  to  Israel. 

When  we  came  to  study  philosophy  or 
to  think  in  the  atmosphere  of  philosophic 
thought,  whether  we  were  students  or  not, 
we  began  to  ask  questions.  Philosophy 
works  in  the  region  of  abstract  thought, 
and  it  is  not  surprising  that  philosophy 
should  talk  more  of  the  divine  than  of 
God.  It  describes  existing  realities  in 
terms  of  quality  rather  than  of  form,  and 
under  its  influence  the  preconceived  lines 
of  form  readily  shade  off  into  indistinct¬ 
ness.  So  perhaps  the  personality  of  God 
grew  dim  to  us.  Moreover,  we  brought 


64 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


from  our  Christian  training  itself  the 
elements  of  a  hard  question.  We  were 
taught  to  think  of  God  as  personal,  after 
the  manner  of  human  personality,  and  at 
the  same  time  as  infinite.  How  do  these 
two  thoughts  combine?  Is  not  a  person 
necessarily  limited  and  self-enclosed,  while 
our  word  “infinite”  is  expressly  declaring 
of  God  that  he  is  unlimited?  Is  not  an 
infinite  person  inconceivable,  because  of 
inherent  contradiction  in  the  terms?  And 
so  the  more  we  dwell  upon  God’s  great¬ 
ness,  and  fill  out  the  meaning  of  his  in¬ 
finity,  the  vaguer  may  our  sense  of  his 
personality  become. 

Moreover,  in  our  time,  science  has 
joined  with  philosophy  in  making  it  harder 
to  think  of  God  in  personal  terms.  Sci¬ 
ence  has  had  no  intention  of  showing  that 
God  is  infinite,  or  of  proving  about  him 
anything  whatever;  and  yet  modern  sci¬ 
ence  has  done  more  than  was  ever  done 
before  to  give  tangible  meaning  to  the  old 


BIVINE  PERSONALITY 


65 


word  “infinite,”  for  minds  that  were  apply¬ 
ing  it  to  God.  Our  age  is  struggling  with 
the  vast  conception  of  a  connected,  con¬ 
tinuous,  interrelated,  and  consistent  uni¬ 
verse  ;  and  those  who  believe  in  God  need 
to  conceive  of  him  as  capable  of  conceiv¬ 
ing,  producing,  conducting,  and  fulfilling 
such  a  universe.  Believers  in  God  had 
long  carried  in  their  minds  the  old  word 
“infinite,”  as  a  word  comparatively  empty 
of  definite  content;  but  science  here  offers 
the  largest  single  contribution  that  has 
ever  been  made  toward  filling  it  with 
meaning.  Never  before  in  the  history  of 
religion  or  of  thought  was  the  sentence 
“God  is  great”  so  redeemed  from  empti¬ 
ness  and  bare  transcendency  as  it  is,  for 
one  who  believes  in  God,  by  the  doctrine 
of  evolution.  Never,  consequently,  did  the 
difficulty  of  conceiving  of  God  as  personal 
stand  out  so  strongly.  No  metaphysical 
infinity  is  here  attributed  to  God,  but 
even  harder  to  deal  with  in  actual  thought 


5 


66 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


is  that  practical  infinity  which  the  enter¬ 
prise  of  the  evolving  universe  implies  in 
him.  It  would  be  easier  if  this  practical 
infinity  appealed  to  the  imagination,  which 
is  akin  to  faith ;  but  at  least  in  the  earlier 
stages  of  thought  it  appeals  to  reason  and 
hard  sense  instead.  We  are  not  asked  to 
feel  God’s  immeasurable  greatness,  but 
are  required  to  take  it  as  a  conclusion 
from  facts,  at  the  end  of  an  argument. 
The  effort  to  combine  greatness  with  per¬ 
sonality  is  thus  transferred  from  the  field 
of  imagination  and  faith  to  that  of  thought, 
and  the  primary  assumption  of  religion  be¬ 
comes  a  problem  in  the  realm  of  theologico- 
scientific  inquiry.  It  is  no  wonder  that 
the  living  sense  of  God’s  personality  grows 
dim  in  such  a  time,  and  that  many  wonder 
whether  the  conception  that  has  always 
thus  far  seemed  indispensable  to  religion 
is  to  abide  with  us  in  force  hereafter. 

Neither  is  it  surprising  that  a  fine 
poetic  feeling  offers  itself  as  mediator 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


67 


between  the  scientific  conception  of  the 
universe  and  the  sense  of  the  personality 
of  God. 

“  I  have  felt 

A  presence  that  disturbs  me  with  the  joy 
Of  elevated  thoughts ;  a  sense  sublime 
Of  something  far  more  deeply  interfused, 

Whose  dwelling  is  the  light  of  setting  suns, 

And  the  round  ocean,  and  the  living  air, 

And  the  blue  sky,  and  in  the  mind  of  man  : 

A  motion  and  a  spirit  that  impels 

All  thinking  things,  all  objects  of  all  thought, 

And  rolls  through  all  things.” 

When  Wordsworth  wrote  thus,  he  was 
not  attempting  theological  suggestion  or 
philosophical  theory.  He  was  not  think¬ 
ing  of  pantheism,  or  of  religion,  or  of 
philosophy;  he  was  thinking  the  thoughts 
of  poetry,  and  reading  the  universal  mean¬ 
ing  of  things.  Yet  he  did  suggest  a 
feeling,  in  view  of  the  universal  presence, 
that  might  creep  in  as  substitute  for  the 
familiar  attitude  of  the  soul  in  the  face 
of  personality.  It  would  not  be  strange 
if  such  a  poetic  sense  of  the  unseen  and 


68 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


vaguely  felt  indwelling  spirit  proved  to  be 
all  that  some  minds  could  retain  of  belief 
in  the  personality  of  God. 

Does  it  matter  much?  Well,  it  makes 
this  difference.  Religion  has  always  re¬ 
garded  the  divine  as  personal,  and  it  would 
seem  that  it  must  always  so  regard  it. 
Religion  speaks  to  the  divine,  and  believes 
itself  heard.  Polytheism  says  “they,”  of 
its  many  deities,  and  addresses  them. 
Monotheism,  with  larger  reach,  says  “he” 
of  its  sole  deity,  and  in  prayer  says  “  thou.” 
“Thou”  is  the  characteristic  word  of  re¬ 
ligion.  If  we  cannot  retain  in  our  belief 
something  that  essentially  corresponds  to 
what  we  know  as  personality,  we  shall  be 
compelled  to  say  “it”  of  the  divine,  in¬ 
stead  of  “thou”  and  “he.”  That  will 
be  a  very  great  and  far-reaching  change. 
The  substitution  of  “it”  for  the  personal 
designations  and  words  of  address,  obliter¬ 
ates  what  has  thus  far  always  been  essen- 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


69 


tial  to  religion.  Some  try  to  tell  us  that 
it  would  not  destroy  religion  itself  to  make 
the  change.  They  think  we  could  have 
an  “it”  religion.  But  at  any  rate  the 
change  would  work  a  tremendous  revolu¬ 
tion,  and  what  was  left  would  scarcely  he 
recognizable  to  one  who  had  known  and 
lived  religion  in  the  old  ways.  It  is  a  most 
important  question,  therefore,  whether  or 
not  we  can  still  say,  in  truth  and  without 
delusion,  “Thou  art  God.”  On  this  ques¬ 
tion  we  seek  for  light. 

We  shall  do  well  to  prepare  for  our 
inquiry  into  divine  personality,  by  seek¬ 
ing  to  know  just  what  we  mean  by  per¬ 
sonality  itself.  I  do  not  know  whether  a 
very  precise  definition  is  possible,  or  not ; 
but  at  any  rate  the  word  represents  a 
familiar  group  of  facts,  and  these  facts  can 
at  least  be  set  forth  with  some  clearness. 

All  that  we  know  about  personality  we 
learn  from  knowledge  of  ourselves  and  of 


70 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


our  kind.  All  the  personality  that  we 
are  acquainted  with  is  human.  We  do 
not  call  any  sub-human  being  a  person. 
Powers  of  the  same  nature  with  those  that 
make  up  personality  in  us  exist  in  lower 
animals,  but  not,  so  far  as  we  can  judge, 
in  such  degree  and  combination  as  to  be 
equivalent  to  what  we  call  personality. 
Something  is  lacking.  Some  of  our  dogs 
seem  almost  personal,  and  yet  we  do  not 
regard  them  as  fully  so.  There  is  a  point 
at  which  the  higher  powers  and  qualities 
exist  in  such  fulness  and  combination  as 
to  constitute  their  possessor  a  person;  and 
that  point,  according  to  general  under¬ 
standing  and  use  of  the  term,  is  at  the 
lower  limit  of  the  human.  How  far  above 
humanity  the  range  of  personal  existence 
may  sweep,  and  through  how  many  orders 
of  greatness,  we  may  not  know;  but 
humanity  is  personal,  and  nothing  below 
it  is  so  regarded. 

What  are  these  powers  and  qualities 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


71 


that  go  to  make  up  personality?  Intelli¬ 
gence  is  one  of  them,  as  no  one  doubts,  — 
intelligence  of  such  grade  as  is  found  in 
men.  The  power  of  volition  is  of  course 
another,  for  will  belongs  to  all  animate 
existence,  and  is  combined  in  man  with 
his  higher  intelligence.  Certain  powers 
of  feeling  —  of  desire,  affection,  love, 
hatred,  passion  of  various  kinds  —  also 
enter,  as  we  all  know,  into  personality. 
These  also  are  common  property  of  ani¬ 
mate  beings,  but  in  man  they  are  of  higher 
grade  than  elsewhere  in  the  animate  world. 
These  elements  of  intelligence,  will,  and 
feeling  are  present  in  a  person,  and  they  are 
more  than  present,  they  are  combined  and 
held  in  conscious  unity.  It  is  true  that  they 
are  combined  by  consciousness  in  the  lower 
animals  that  we  do  not  call  persons ;  and 
we  can  never  tell  just  how  the  personal 
combination  differs  from  the  non-personal 
that  is  below  it.  But  we  speak  of  self- 
consciousness,  and  of  personal  conscious- 


72 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


ness,  and  of  personal  unity,  and  of  personal 
identity,  —  names  by  which  we  affirm  an 
undefinable  but  real  fact.  Somehow,  in 
what  probably  must  always  remain  a  mys¬ 
terious  way,  these  powers  are  gathered  up 
into  a  conscious  unity,  and  the  result  is 
what  we  name  personality.  The  person 
possesses  the  intelligence,  and  feels  the 
passions  and  affections,  and  exercises  the 
will.  The  powers  are  his,  and  his  is 
the  action,  and  he  is  himself.  He  is 
always  himself,  and  not  another.  It  is  true 
that  there  is  such  a  thing  as  abnormal 
change  of  personalit}7,  and  double  person¬ 
ality,  concerning  which  we  know  facts 
that  we  are  utterly  unable  to  explain ;  but 
the  normal  course  of  personal  life  is  con¬ 
tinuous,  with  unbroken  consciousness  of 
personal  identity,  and  with  moral  respon¬ 
sibility  as  unbroken  as  the  consciousness. 
Moral  responsibility,  I  say,  for  moral  re¬ 
sponsibility  is  the  inseparable  companion 
of  personality;  and  from  moral  responsi- 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


73 


bility  comes  the  possibility,  and  the  cer¬ 
tainty,  of  character.  It  belongs  to  the 
very  nature  of  a  person  that  he  does 
right  or  wrong,  good  or  evil,  and  comes 
to  be  himself  good  or  bad,  or  partly  good 
and  partly  bad.  To  nothing  but  a  per¬ 
son  is  character  possible,  but  to  every 
personal  being  character  is  certain  to 
belong. 

Can  we  define  in  few  words  that  which 
we  have  thus  set  before  us?  Not  per¬ 
fectly,  perhaps,  but  some  one  has  said  that 
personality  consists  in  the  union  of  intelli¬ 
gence  with  power.  I  should  wish  to  add 
affection;  and  I  would  ask  whether  per¬ 
sonality,  as  we  know  it,  does  not  consist 
in  the  conscious  unity  of  intelligence, 
affection,  and  power.  Under  this  defini¬ 
tion  we  should  find  rudimentary  personal¬ 
ity  below  man;  but  we  should  apply  the 
full  name,  personality,  to  the  conscious 
unity  of  intelligence,  affection,  and  power 
existing  in  human  degree. 


74 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


Personality,  thus  conceived,  is  the  high¬ 
est  form  of  life  of  which  we  have  any  con¬ 
ception.  Of  course  we  know  that  it  is  the 
highest  form  of  life  that  has  been  reached 
in  the  evolution  of  this  world,  but  we  can 
say  more  than  this.  It  certainly  would  seem 
to  be  the  highest  form  of  life  to  which  it  is 
possible  for  finite  being  to  attain.  Intelli¬ 
gence,  affection,  will ;  to  know,  to  love,  to 
act,  —  these  seem  to  be  the  highest  powers 
that  the  finite  can  hope  ever  to  possess. 
If  any  higher  powers  than  these  exist  or 
can  exist,  no  sign  of  them  is  apparent 
anywhere  in  the  order  of  the  world  or  the 
indications  of  the  unknown  that  existence 
gives.  I  freely  own  that  I  cannot  prove 
that  there  are  no  higher  powers  than  these. 
My  limitation  to  three  dimensions  of  space 
does  not  prove  there  is  not  a  fourth,  and 
my  limitation  to  this  triad  of  personal 
powers  does  not  prove  that  no  others  exist 
or  are  possible.  Yet  in  this  noble  triad 
of  powers  I  find  so  splendid  a  unity  and 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


75 


completeness,  and  so  fine  a  sufficiency  for 
the  purposes  of  existence,  that  I  firmly 
believe  that  there  is  nothing  in  store  for 
finite  being  beyond  the  elements  that  are 
now  gathered  in  the  conscious  unity  of 
personal  life,  —  the  power  to  know,  the 
power  to  love,  and  the  power  to  act. 

I  must  now  add  another  fact  about  per¬ 
sonality,  essential  to  the  present  purpose, 
—  namely,  that  in  human  experience, 
which  teaches  us  all  that  we  know  about 
it,  personality  is  not  at  once  complete, 
but  is  a  growing  thing.  This  is  true  in 
the  case  of  the  human  individual.  A 
new-born  child  is  not  yet  a  person.  The 
elements  of  which  personality  is  composed 
are  indeed  included  in  the  inheritance 
from  antecedent  humanity  and  from  all 
antecedent  life;  but  only  in  the  experi¬ 
ence  of  living  are  these  inherited  elements 
developed.  Only  through  experience  in 
life  does  the  child  become  able  to  exer- 


;6 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


cise  the  powers  of  thought,  affection,  and 
will.  At  first  the  exercise  of  these  powers 
is  tentative,  fragmentary,  unorganized ; 
and  only  through  practice  can  anything  like 
organic  personal  completeness  be  attained. 
As  for  that  fine  and  well-balanced  unity  of 
powers  in  which  personality  is  completed, 
and  which  would  seem  to  be  the  normal 
human  endowment,  only  by  the  long  and 
varied  experience  of  life  does  it  become 
possible.  Indeed,  no  one  has  ever  seen 
it  yet.  The  longest  lifetime  is  not  long 
enough  to  bring  the  elements  of  personality 
up  to  that  completeness,  co-ordination  and 
efficient  unity  of  which  by  their  nature  they 
are  capable.  Progress  in  successful  exist¬ 
ence  consists,  in  fact,  on  the  side  of  one’s 
own  development,  in  the  training  of  the 
powers  that  constitute  personality,  and  the 
building  up  of  that  mysterious  unity  by 
which  the  person  is  fully  himself.  So  it 
comes  to  pass  that  there  is  an  ideal  of 
human  personality  that  lies  far  beyond  all 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


77 


present  degrees  of  attainment  in  fulness 
and  unity  of  being.  Complete  personality 
is  the  goal  and  crown  of  individual  evolu¬ 
tion.  We  have  no  difficulty  in  thinking 
of  a  human  being  in  whom  all  that  is 

essential  to  personality  is  far  more  perfect, 

« 

and  the  efficient  unity  of  powers  is  far 
more  complete,  than  in  any  human  being 
who  has  yet  existed.  Such  a  person, 
when  he  comes  to  exist,  will  be  the  ideal 
man.  Through  all  favorable  conditions 
and  all  normal  progress,  by  work  and 
struggle,  joy  and  sorrow,  conflict  and  vic¬ 
tory,  individuals  are  advancing  toward 
this  ideal.  Life  is  too  short  for  attaining 
it,  but  life  is  to  be  continued  beyond  the 
present  scenes,  and  the  long  future  may 
bring  the  ideal  completion  of  personality. 

Furthermore,  what  is  true  of  the  indi¬ 
vidual  is  true  of  the  race.  In  the  long 
experience  of  mankind,  as  well  as  in  the 
career  of  an  individual,  personality  is  a 
growing  thing.  When  we  have  drawn  the 


73 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


line  of  personality  between  man  and  the 
creatures  below  him,  we  might  proceed  to 
say  that  since  a  man  is  a  person,  all  men 
are  equally  persons;  but  experience  does 
not  justify  such  a  statement.  Some  men 
are  far  more  fully  and  richly  personal  than 
others.  There  is  such  a  state  as  that  of 
race-infancy ;  and  in  that  state  some  parts 
of  humanity  are  still  lingering.  Pre¬ 
historic  man,  whether  among  the  flints  of 
glacial  time,  or  at  a  higher  stage,  in  the 
heart  of  Africa  to-day,  is  less  fully  per¬ 
sonal  than  historic  and  civilized  man. 
The  tendency  of  civilization,  of  education, 
of  advanced  experience,  and  of  all  enlarg¬ 
ing  influences,  is  toward  the  enrichment 
and  completion  of  personality.  I  say  no 
new  thing  when  I  say  that  there  is  a 
higher  degree  of  personality  in  the  best- 
developed  part  of  mankind  to-day,  than 
there  was  in  the  best-developed  part  of 
mankind  two  thousand  years  ago.  It  has 
already  been  remarked  that  though  the  word 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


79 


“person”  is  ancient,  the  present  signifi¬ 
cation  of  it  is  modern,  and  that  the  abstract 
noun  “personality”  has  no  equivalent  in 
the  Greek  language  or  the  Latin,  for  the 
reason  that  the  abstract  idea  that  it  ex¬ 
presses  had  no  existence  in  the  thought  of 
the  classical  world.  The  thing  that  we 
mean  by  personality  had  not  then  been 
identified  in  thought,  partly  because  it  had 
not  yet  attained  such  proportions  of  ful- 
ness  and  efficiency  as  to  take  rank  among 
clearly  observed  realities.  Personality,  as 
an  endowment  of  human  beings,  has  been 
in  history  an  actually  growing  thing.  Age 
after  age  has  seen  men  possessing  it  in 
fuller  degree.  Stage  after  stage  of  his¬ 
torical  progress  has  found  the  elements 
that  make  up  personality  further  devel¬ 
oped,  the  personal  unity  better  girt  and 
managed,  the  sense  of  personality  more 
pronounced,  and  the  uses  of  personality 
more  largely  fulfilled  in  the  relations  of 
life.  As  personality  is  the  goal  of  indi- 


8o 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


yidual  evolution,  so  personality  is  the  goal 
and  crown  of  the  evolution  of  the  race. 
Indeed,  we  do  not  reach  the  truth  until 
we  say  that  personality,  and  the  comple¬ 
tion  of  personality,  is  the  goal  of  the 
entire  process  of  evolution  in  this  world. 
Man  is  the  crown  of  the  process,  and  full 
personality  is  the  normal  destiny  of  man. 
The  experience  of  the  race  nourishes, 
guides,  and  develops  personality,  and  the 
career  of  the  individual  is  directed  toward 
the  attainment  of  it.  Every  individual 
moves  from  impersonal  infancy  toward  full 
personal  rank  and  force,  and  the  race 
moves  from  a  stage  at  which  personality 
is  infant-like,  toward  a  stage  at  which 
personality  in  its  individuals  is  large,  rich, 
and  fine.  Personality  is  the  crown  of 
evolution. 

Have  I  dwelt  too  long  upon  these  state¬ 
ments  about  personality  in  man?  But  I 
have  use  for  them.  Personality  is  the 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


8 1 


highest  form  of  existence  that  is  known 
to  us,  and  toward  the  completion  of  this 
highest  form  of  existence  that  we  know, 
mankind  is  visibly  advancing.  Now  I 
wish  to  see  what  we  can  fairly  infer  from 
this  concerning  God. 

When  we  seek  to  know  that  Being 
whose  existence  underlies  our  own,  and 
validates  our  mental  and  moral  processes, 
we  can  dwell,  in  our  inquiry,  more  upon 
the  resemblances  between  ourselves  and 
him,  or  more  upon  the  differences.  Dif¬ 
ferences  and  resemblances  there  are,  of 
course,  and  to  our  exploring  minds  the 
differences  at  once  present  themselves. 
Great  they  are,  and  baffling  to  our 
thought,  if  we  set  them  at  the  front  and 
consider  them  the  decisive  element  in  our 
conception  of  God.  But  we  must  firmly 
hold  that  the  differences  between  God  and 
man  are  differences  between  beings  that 
are  essentially  resemblant.  Not  only  does 
1  6 


82 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


the  Christian  doctrine  proclaim  that  man 
hears  God’s  likeness,  and  thus  assert  that 
the  resemblances  run  deeper  than  the  dif¬ 
ferences  ;  but  the  very  existence  of  science, 
as  we  have  seen,  brings  daily  before  our 
eyes  the  likeness  of  our  minds  to  the  mind 
that  is  in  the  universe.  God  and  man 
are  alike;  alike  with  vast  differences,  but 
really  alike.  This  is  so,  or  else  religion, 
science,  and  philosophy  are  all  mislead¬ 
ing  and  false  together.  The  differences 
between  God  and  man,  the  great  unlike¬ 
nesses,  we  will  not  minify,  but  will  recog¬ 
nize  to  the  full,  for  they  are  essential  to 
the  trustworthiness  of  our  thinking.  Our 
incipient  and  growing  minds  need  the  sup¬ 
port  of  a  mind  infinitely  vaster  than  we, 
in  order  to  be  sure  of  themselves  at  all, 
and  the  differences  that  often  baffle  us  are 
really  our  rest  and  strength,  when  we 
think  wisely  of  them.  But  when  we  seek 
to  know  what  God  is,  we  will  not  begin 
with  the  contrasts  between  ourselves  and 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


83 


him.  It  is  our  privilege  to  begin  with  the 
resemblances.  We  will  not  first  inquire 
how  there  can  be  anything  like  what  we 
call  personality  in  God  in  spite  of  the  im¬ 
measurable  contrasts.  We  will  ask  what 
resemblances  to  our  kind  of  personality  we 
can  trace  in  God,  and  then  will  open  our 
minds  to  the  significance  of  the  differences. 

What,  then,  is  God?  At  the  outset, 
God  is  a  great  Thinker.  He  is  a  thinker 
so  great  as  to  embrace  in  his  thought  the 
entire  existence  and  movement  of  the 
universe.  If  this  seems  too  confidently 
affirmed,  remember  the  alternative.  The 
universe  has  been  thought  through,  or  it 
has  not.  If  it  has  not,  there  is  nothing 
to  give  it  meaning  and  consistency.  But 
it  has  meaning  and  consistency,  and  we 
are  constantly  gaining  fresh  evidence  that 
it  has  been  thought  through.  God  is  a 
great  Thinker.  His  thinking  and  his 
knowing  must  differ  widely  in  method 


84 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


from  ours,  but  we  have  no  need  to  fathom 
all  the  mysteries  of  his  thinking;  the  fact 
stands  firm,  that  he  has  so  known  all 
things  as  that  all  things  derive  a  genuine 
unity  from  his  comprehensive  thought  of 
them,  and  that  thus  he  is  a  thinker  and 
knower,  unlike  us,  and  yet  more  pro¬ 
foundly  like  us  than  unlike.  Kepler  was 
right  wdien  he  said  of  the  meanings  that 
he  read  in  the  visible  universe,  “  O  God,  I 
think  thy  thoughts  after  thee.” 

If  the  universe  shows  God  to  be  a  great 
thinker,  there  is  good  reason  why  we 
should  take  the  next  step,  and  affirm  that 
God  is  also  a  great  Wilier.  First  of  all, 
we  do  not  know  anything  about  thinkers 
that  are  not  willers.  Thought,  so  far  as 
we  have  ken  of  it  at  all,  is  always  ac¬ 
companied  by  volition.  From  the  lowest 
regions  where  thought  appears  to  the 
highest  that  is  known  to  man,  this  is  the 
rule, — whatever  thinks,  wills.  Nay,  will 
runs  even  lower  in  the  world  of  life  than 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


85 


thought,  if  that  is  possible,  and  seems 
even  more  fundamental  and  inalienable  as 
an  element  in  conscious  being.  And  when 
we  reach  the  vast  and  comprehensive 
thought,  so  wide-sweeping  and  far-seeing 
as  to  suggest  that  here  must  he  the  perfect 
thinker,  surely  here  we  have  no  reason  to 
suppose  a  falling  off  in  quality,  and  imag¬ 
ine  this  mind  divorced  from  will.  More¬ 
over,  the  signs  of  will  are  found  wherever 
the  signs  of  this  thinking  mind  appear. 
The  universe,  physical  and  psychical,  is  a 
system,  expressive  of  a  mind;  and  what 
else  can  he  so  probable  as  that  the  mind 
willed  the  system?  There  are  some  who 
think  that  all  exertion  or  exercise  of 
energy,  in  all  forms  whatever,  proceeds 
through  direct  action  of  the  will  of  God, 
so  that  the  sum-total  of  force  throughout 
the  universe  is  simply  God’s  strength, 
put  forth  in  incessant  activity  by  God’s 
will.  I  confess  I  do  not  know  how  else 
to  account  for  it,  nor  has  any  one,  I  sup- 


86 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


pose,  a  clear  and  solid  theory  of  the  inde¬ 
pendent  origin  of  energy;  and  yet  I  dare 
not  theorize  very  confidently  about  God’s 
willing,  and  do  not  care  to  insist  upon  any 
such  explanation  of  universal  energy  as  I 
have  named.  I  do  not  need  to  press  the 
description  of  God’s  willing  into  details, 
in  order  to  assert  that  God  is  a  great 
Wilier.  The  overwhelming  probability  is, 
that  the  mind  that  thought  the  system 
willed  it,  and  so  caused  it  to  he  the  sys¬ 
tem  that  was  in  force.  Indeed,  thought 
unable  to  express  itself  in  will  is  but  feeble 
and  barren;  and  not  such  is  the  thought 
that  comprehends  all  things.  He  who 
thought  the  system  willed  the  system 
also. 

But  there  is  something  to  be  added  to 
thought  and  will.  Remember  that  we  found 
it  just  as  necessary  to  hold  that  God  is 
good  as  that  God  is  intelligent.  If  we  did 
not  hold  this,  we  could  not  permanently  re¬ 
tain  our  confidence  in  our  own  moral  con- 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


87 


victions,  and  we  could  have  no  worthy 
religion.  The  alternative  to  a  good  God 
is  universal  moral  desolation.  So  I  say 
that  God  is  good,  and  thereby  I  ascribe  to 
him  a  character.  Goodness  implies  more 
than  intelligence  and  will;  goodness  im¬ 
plies  affection.  If  God  is  good,  God  is  a 
great  Lover.  Other  words  may  be  added 
to  complete  the  description  of  the  character 
that  is  covered  by  the  one  word  “good,” 
and  I  do  not  rule  them  out  by  select¬ 
ing  this.  I  select  this  because  I  want  just 
here  a  word  to  describe  the  normal  exer¬ 
cise  of  the  highest  moral  excellence;  and 
by  the  common  consent  of  those  who  know 
what  moral  action  is,  there  is  no  nobler 
word  or  truer  than  this  word  “love.”  An 
all-comprehending  mind  that  wills  a  uni¬ 
verse  must  will  it  in  love,  or  else  not  will 
it  worthily  at  all.  God  is  either  love  or 
wrong,  highest  love  or  bitterest  wrong. 
When  once  we  have  assented  in  any  de¬ 
gree  that  God  is  good,  we  have  committed 


88 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


ourselves  to  believe  in  an  eternal  love, 
and  so  in  an  eternal  Lover.  The  infinite 
Intelligence  is  an  affectional  Being  also, 
caring  for  that  which  he  has  made,  and 
regarding  things  that  exist  with  feeling 
that  worthily  corresponds  to  their  char¬ 
acter.  I  know  that  it  is  a  great  thing  to 
attribute  to  the  great  unseen  One  a  heart, 
and  to  declare  that  he  really  loves  his 
creatures.  But  I  cannot  say  that  he  is 
good  without  saying  this,  and  I  cannot 
deny  that  he  is  good  without  stultifying 
my  own  moral  and  religious  nature.  So 
I  say  that  God  has  a  heart,  or  is  a  heart, 
as  well  as  a  mind  and  a  will. 

Thus  we  are  sure  that  the  Being  who 
stands  back  of  all  existence  that  we  can 
know  resembles  us  in  the  qualities  essen¬ 
tial  to  personality.  He  is  thinker,  he  is 
wilier,  he  is  lover.  W e  can  go  one  step  far¬ 
ther  yet,  I  am  sure,  and  be  safe  in  affirm¬ 
ing  that  in  him  these  powers  are  bound 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


89 


together  in  a  conscious  unity.  When  I 
cast  about  for  means  of  proving  this,  I  am 
at  a  loss  to  find  them,  because  the  fact 
seems  to  me  so  obvious  as  scarcely  to  be 
capable  of  proof.  We  may  remember  that 
this  is  no  rare  combination  to  which  our 
argument  has  led  us,  —  this  combination  of 
thought,  will,  and  affection  in  conscious 
unity.  It  is  actually  the  commonest  thing 
in  all  the  human  world,  for  it  exists  wher¬ 
ever  there  is  a  human  being.  Wherever 
these  elements  are  found,  they  are  found 
in  conscious  unity.  What  they  would  be 
apart,  we  have  no  idea.  Thought  without 
feeling,  feeling  without  will,  will  with¬ 
out  feeling  and  thought,  —  these  are  mere 
words,  empty  names,  signifying  nothing. 
If  these  powers  exist  apart  from  one 
another,  it  is  something  utterly  contra¬ 
dictory  to  the  nature  of  mind,  will,  and 
character  as  we  know  them,  —  not  above 
our  knowledge  and  beyond  it,  but  against 
it,  and  destructive  of  our  certainty.  These 


90 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


powers  are  so  related  to  one  another  that 
each  requires  the  rest,  in  order  to  any 
worthy  exercise.  Alone,  no  one  of  them 
could  be  itself.  Indeed,  if  we  entertain 
any  large  and  fine  idea  of  them,  and  think 
of  them  at  all  in  their  ideal  fulness  of 
meaning,  we  shall  not  be  able  to  conceive 
of  any  one  of  the  three  as  existing  without 
the  others.  Here  is  a  genuine  triunity. 
Intelligence,  affection,  and  will  ought 
to  be  an  inseparable  triad,  and  such  they 
are.  Bound  together  in  conscious  unity, 
they  supplement  and  support  one  another, 
and  are  sufficient  to  make  an  effective 
spiritual  being.  Now,  if  these  high  powers 
exist  in  the  mind  to  which  the  world  gives 
expression,  of  course  they  are  bound  to¬ 
gether  in  conscious  unity.  Is  that  mind 
less  completely  organized  than  ours,  and 
less  effective  ?  And  where  is  our  loyalty 
to  that  far-reaching  modern  idea,  the  idea 
of  unity,  if  we  hesitate  for  a  moment  to 
regard  these  essential  powers  of  personal- 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


91 


ity  as  held  together  in  the  oneness  of  con¬ 
scious  being?  But  I  must  not  speak  at 
length  of  this,  for  it  is  scarcely  respectful 
to  my  audience  to  he  trying  to  show  that 
thought,  character,  and  will,  existing  on  a 
scale  as  vast  as  the  universe,  must  exist 
as  elements  in  the  conscious  life  of  One 
who  knows  himself  and  directs  his  own 
activity. 

Yet  I  may  add,  by  way  of  illustration, 
that  yesterday,  after  the  lecture,  in  which 
I  had  said  that  if  there  is  no  intelligent 
conceiving  mind  science  is  impossible,  I 
was  asked  whether  cause  and  effect  with¬ 
out  intelligence  would  not  suffice  to  make 
a  trustworthy  order  in  which  there  might 
be  science.  My  answer  was  that  cause 
and  effect  without  intelligence  is  some¬ 
thing  very  easily  put  into  words,  but  not 
so  easily  put  into  thought.  Cause  and 
effect  without  intelligence,  —  can  you  fill 
the  words  with  satisfactory  meaning  ?  Do 
they  express  a  manageable  idea?  What, 


92 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


then,  is  the  link  between  cause  and  effect? 
—  for  certainly  there  must  be  some  prin¬ 
ciple  of  connection,  or  effect  would  net 
follow  cause.  We  are  accustomed  to  say 
that  every  effect  has  its  adequate  cause, 
and  every  cause  its  appropriate  effect. 
There  is  a  constant  element  of  corre¬ 
spondence  and  equivalence  here;  the  ade¬ 
quacy  and  appropriateness  not  only  form 
an  essential  part  of  the  idea  of  cause  and 
effect,  but  constitute  the  living  quality 
of  the  idea.  Whence  came  they?  How 
did  adequacy  and  appropriateness  in  this 
field  originate?  How  was  such  an  idea 
impressed  upon  the  universe?  By  what 
kind  of  agency  has  it  been  maintained  in 
perpetual  and  universal  operation?  How 
are  cause  and  effect  kept  yoked  together 
by  this  unfailing  bond  of  adequacy  and 
appropriateness  ?  It  is  not  enough  to  say 
that  force  is  the  link  between  cause  and 
effect,  or  to  suggest  power  in  any  form  as 
sufficient  here.  There  is  more  than  power 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


93 


in  this.  The  link  between  cause  and 
effect  is  formed  of  two  elements,  —  power 
and  intelligence,  or,  rather,  intelligence 
and  power.  Causation  implies  intelligence 
as  clearly  as  it  implies  power.  It  implies 
intelligence  as  antecedent  to  the  operation 
of  power  in  the  producing  of  effect  from 
cause.  The  world  of  cause  and  effect  is 
a  world  of  intelligence,  for  the  energy  to 
which  it  gives  expression  is  energy  intelli¬ 
gently  guided.  No,  there  is  no  division 
or  scattering.  Mental  powers  are  found 
only  in  a  mind.  We  shall  never  find, 
with  all  our  searching,  the  elements  of 
personality  separate  from  one  another, 
lying  about  loose  in  the  universe,  operat¬ 
ing  piecemeal  in  the  work  of  existence. 
We  have  never  found  them  separate  in 
the  human  field,  and  we  shall  never  find 
them  separate  in  the  divine.  Personality 
has  exclusive  possession  of  the  powers 
that  compose  it.  The  elements  of  person¬ 
ality —  intelligence,  affection,  and  will  — 


94 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


always  exist  as  elements  of  personality, 
and  are  never  seen  in  any  other  form  or 
relation.  When  we  behold  them  expressed 
in  that  vast  work  which  we  call  the  uni¬ 
verse,  we  may  be  sure  that  here  also,  in 
the  mind  from  which  the  universe  pro¬ 
ceeds,  they  are  hound  together  in  the  con¬ 
scious  oneness  of  personal  being. 

So  I  call  God  personal.  Following  the 
line  of  resemblance  in  seeking  to  know 
what  he  is,  I  find  this  at  the  end  of  it. 
Differences  may  be  as  they  may,  but  with 
essential  truthfulness  the  word  “  personal  ” 
is  applied  to  God. 

And  yet  this  statement  does  not  express 
the  whole  truth,  for  it  leaves  untouched 
an  important  fact  concerning  the  nature  of 
the  difference  between  ourselves  and  God. 
It  is  sometimes  said  that  the  word  “per¬ 
sonal  ”  may  be  true  of  God  and  yet  inade¬ 
quate  ;  that  God  may  be  more  than  personal, 
—  superpersonal,  some  have  suggested,  — • 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


95 


living  a  life  so  unlike  ours  that  to  call 
him  a  person  is  only  to  hint  at  what  he  is, 
leaving  vast  ranges  of  possibility  for  life 
that  cannot  be  called  personal  at  all.  But 
I  do  not  think  this  is  the  right  account 
of  the  difference  between  God  and  us. 
Rightly  conceived,  the  difference  itself 
falls  into  the  line  of  resemblances.  The 
peculiarity  of  God  is  nothing  else  than 
this,  that  God  is  the  only  perfect  person. 
If  we  knew  all,  wTe  should  know  that  God 
is  more  truly  and  fully  personal  than  any 
finite  being  is  or  can  be.  He  is  the  per¬ 
fect  type  of  all  personality. 

We  have  seen  that  human  personality 
is  never  perfect,  but  is  an  ever-growing 
thing,  with  high  possibilities  not  reached 
as  yet  or  even  apprehended.  In  the  fill¬ 
ing  out,  the  balancing  and  the  efficient 
wielding  of  the  powers  that  make  us 
persons,  there  are  unattained  possibilities 
immeasurably  great.  We  are  slowly  grow¬ 
ing  toward  them,  perhaps,  and  in  the  great 


96 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


future  we  hope  to  attain  to  some  of  them, 
for  it  hath  not  yet  been  manifested  what 
we  shall  be.  But  in  all  that  we  may 
become,  in  fulfilment  of  our  worthy  possi¬ 
bilities,  we  know  that  we  shall  be  like 
Him.  The  ideal  of  our  personal  constitu¬ 
tion  is  not  in  ourselves,  but  in  God,  and 
in  completing  our  personality  we  grow  up 
into  his  likeness.  This  is  our  process 
from  the  beginning.  Starting  with  the 
crude,  unorganized,  unconscious  material 
that  we  have  in  infancy,  we  move  on 
through  the  ascending  course  of  life.  We 
become  aware  of  ourselves,  we  get  our 
powers  in  hand,  we  gird  up  the  loins  of 
our  personal  unity  as  we  advance,  and  so 
we  become  more  completely  personal  as 
our  years  pass.  But  it  is  not  merely  our¬ 
selves  that  we  are  growing  up  to.  The 
type  of  our  personal  being  is  not  in  our¬ 
selves,  or  anywhere  in  our  human  kind; 
it  is  in  God.  There  exists  one  supreme, 
typical,  perfect  Person,  and  there  also 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


97 


exist  innumerable  incipient,  adolescent 
persons,  getting  their  personality  as  they 
go,  growing  up  into  his  likeness.  This  is 
the  story  of  personal  existence.  And  yet 
we  shall  not  attain  fully  to  his  likeness; 
he  will  always  be  beyond  us.  It  is  not 
for  creatures  starting  from  personal  non- 
being  to  become  entirely  like  the  great 
Original,  who  is  from  everlasting  to  ever¬ 
lasting,  whose  thought  is  all-embracing, 
whose  affection  is  perfect,  whose  will  is 
universal,  and  whose  unity  is  complete. 
He  stands  alone,  in  the  unapproachable 
glory  of  the  perfect  Person.  This  is  the 
difference  between  God  and  us,  —  a  differ¬ 
ence  on  the  line  of  likeness,  and  a  dif¬ 
ference  that  inspires  us  to  adore  and  trust 
the  One  who  is  like  us  and  yet  forever 
gloriously  unlike. 

Perhaps  some  one  will  wish  to  stop  me 
here,  seeking  for  clearness,  and  ask  just 
what  I  mean  by  the  perfect  person,  and 
whether  I  know  what  I  mean  by  that 


7 


98 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


name.  I  am  willing  to  answer,  for  I 
know  what  I  mean.  I  know  what  a  per¬ 
son  is,  by  studying  myself  and  others  who 
are  like  me.  What  a  perfect  person  would 
be,  I  learn  from  what  a  person  is,  by  con¬ 
ceiving  perfection  of  the  powers  and  rela¬ 
tions  that  constitute  personality.  I  cannot 
describe  a  perfect  person  in  all  his  glory, 
but  I  can  tell  what  makes  one.  By  the 
perfect  person  I  mean  the  Being  in  whom 
the  essential  powers  that  constitute  per¬ 
sonality  —  intelligence,  affection  and  will 
—  exist  in  perfect  quality  and  degree,  and 
are  perfectly  bound  together,  and  wielded 
in  use,  in  the  unity  of  self-directing  con¬ 
sciousness.  This  is  the  perfect  person. 

And  then  questions  may  spring  up  on 
every  side,  touching  on  all  the  peculiari¬ 
ties  of  perfection.  Do  I  know  how  a 
perfect  person  exercises  the  power  of 
knowing,  so  that  I  can  solve  the  mysteries 
of  omniscience  ?  Do  I  understand  the  work¬ 
ing  of  the  perfect  will?  Am  I  not  obliged 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


99 


to  discuss  the  ancient  difficulty  about  an 
infinite  person,  limited  and  unlimited  at 
once?  To  all  of  which  I  have  one  answer. 
These  things  I  do  not  know,  and  do  not 
need  to  know.  What  am  I,  that  I  should 
understand  the  specialties  of  perfection,  in 
any  sphere  ?  Why  ask  a  child  to  define  a 
man  ?  Why  expect  a  man  to  expound  the 
peculiarities  of  God?  I  may  know  where 
they  lie,  but  I  can  never  describe  them. 
It  is  strictly  impossible  that  I  should  know 
just  how  the  perfect  person  differs  from 
imperfect  persons  in  the  operation  of  the 
powers  that  are  common  to  both.  If  I 
were  seeking  to  establish  the  divine  per¬ 
sonality  to  my  own  mind  by  defining  its 
peculiarities,  I  should  be  doomed  to  fail. 
But  I  can  establish  it  to  my  own  mind  by 
tracing  out  the  lines  of  resemblance  to  the 
personality  that  I  possess,  and  that  is  better, 
and  sufficient.  But,  moreover,  when  once 
I  have  thus  become  satisfied  of  the  divine 
personality  on  the  ground  of  resemblance, 


100 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


then  the  differences  that  once  perplexed 
me  find  their  meaning  and  glow  with 
light.  I  did  not  expect  to  find  in  God  a 
personality  just  like  my  own.  If  I  could, 
he  would  be  no  God,  but  only  a  man  like 
me.  The  mind  that  I  have  searched  out 
in  the  universe  is  greater  than  I,  and  the 
God  whom  I  have  seen  in  the  light  of 
revelation  is  greater  than  I.  My  powers 
come  quickly  to  their  limits,  —  his  never. 
Though  mine  should  grow  to  their  appro¬ 
priate  perfection,  they  will  still  be  limited, 
adequate  only  to  such  existence  as  I  was 
created  for;  but  he  is  unmeasured  and 
immeasurable.  Far  beyond  the  possibili¬ 
ties  of  human  personality  do  the  powers 
and  glories  of  his  divine  personality  ex¬ 
tend.  This  is  the  glory  of  what  I  learn 
of  him,  — that  his  powers  are  great  enough 
to  lay  in  the  created  universe  that  ever¬ 
lasting  foundation  for  all  my  mental  and 
moral  processes,  by  virtue  of  which  I  can 
rest  in  my  fundamental  certainties.  God, 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


IOI 


who  is  one  in  the  unity  of  a  perfect  per¬ 
sonality,  is  great  enough  to  serve  for  sus¬ 
taining  and  support  to  the  intellectual  and 
spiritual  being  of  all  the  finite  persons, 
offspring  of  his  own  personality,  to  whom 
he  has  given  existence.  This  is  the  com¬ 
fort  that  we  may  find  in  recognizing  the 
perfect  person,  source  of  all  our  person¬ 
ality,  sufficient  to  he  our  eternal  rest, 
because  of  the  resemblances,  and  because 
of  the  differences,  between  his  personality 
and  our  own. 

Thus  does  belief  in  divine  personality 
commend  itself.  I  have  not  been  speak¬ 
ing  of  it  in  terms  of  Christian  faith,  or 
indeed  of  religion  at  all.  I  think  it  can 
be  reasonably  maintained,  apart  from  relig¬ 
ion,  in  the  field  of  general  thought.  But 
when  I  say  this,  I  shall  be  reminded  that 
the  doctrine  of  evolution  is  often,  perhaps 
generally,  regarded  as  unfavorable,  if  not 
hostile,  to  belief  in  a  personal  God.  To 


102 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


me,  however,  it  seems  quite  otherwise.  I 
cannot  follow  the  thought  of  evolution 
through  without  finding  the  divine  per¬ 
sonality  at  the  end  of  it.  There  it  stands, 
not  always  to  remain  unnoticed  and  un¬ 
acknowledged.  Before  I  leave  the  matter 
I  must  show,  in  few  words,  why  I  say  this. 

It  is  an  old  story,  too  old  to  need  tell¬ 
ing  now,  that  in  the  evolution  of  our 
world  we  have  a  forward  movement,  more 
and  more  full  of  traceable  meaning  as  it 
advances.  This  bringing  forth  of  greater 
and  greater  meaning  is  proof  of  a  con¬ 
ceiving  and  directing  mind.  The  idea  of 
mindless  evolution  will  be  relegated  before 
long  to  the  chamber  of  outgrown  things. 
The  universe  is  the  conception  and  off¬ 
spring  of  a  mind.  What  I  now  wish  to 
say  is,  that  the  upward  movement  consists 
in  the  taking  on  by  the  universe  of  more 
and  more  of  the  likeness  of  the  mind  that 
brought  it  forth.  The  meaning  of  the 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


103 


advance  is  this,  that  with  every  step  there 
is  something  more  like  God  than  was  any¬ 
thing  before.  The  highest  stage  always 
expresses  most  of  the  conceiving  and  pro¬ 
ductive  mind. 

The  process  by  which  the  earth  itself 
was  formed  might  have  seemed  to  a  be¬ 
holder,  if  there  had  been  one,  aimless  and 
vain;  yet  it  was  an  orderly  process,  and 
that  at  least  was  like  God.  When  it  had 
become  a  world,  and  had  been  a  world  for 
ages,  life  appeared  upon  it.  A  wonderful 
thing  was  life,  and  wonderful  in  this,  that 
even  in  its  lowest  forms  it  bore  a  likeness 
to  God,  the  living  Spirit,  the  conceiving 
Mind,  such  as  nothing  had  borne  before 
it.  Higher  it  rose,  and  richer  it  became. 
Consciousness  entered.  Life  ascended 
into  mind,  judgment,  love,  thus  taking  on 
greater  and  nobler  likeness  to  God.  In 
reason  —  godlike  reason  we  call  it — and 
in  love  and  moral  judgment  we  behold 
the  very  image  of  God,  appearing  upon 


104 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


his  highest  earthly  creature.  Now  gradu¬ 
ally,  out  of  the  experience  of  rational  life, 
personality  grows  up,  and  slowly  moves 
on  toward  completeness.  It  is  the  con¬ 
scious  unity  of  the  godlike  powers  of  man. 
Man  stands  forth,  not  indeed  a  perfect  or 
a  full-grown  person,  but  at  least  a  new¬ 
born  and  growing  person,  bearing  in  his 
conscious  unity  of  intelligence,  affection  and 
will,  the  high  possibilities  of  the  highest 
known  form  of  being.  On  what  principle 
shall  we  deny  or  question  that  this  crown 
of  human  existence'*  is  simply  one  more 
resemblance  to  that  original  Being  who  is 
the  type  of  all?  The  ideals  of  the  unfold¬ 
ing  universe  have  existed  from  eternity  in 
the  being  of  the  conceiving  and  creative 
source,  and  the  long  work  of  time  has 
been  the  impressing  of  more  and  more  of 
the  likeness  of  that  source  upon  its  off¬ 
spring.  Now  we  behold  man,  with  spirit¬ 
ual  powers  so  similar  to  those  which  the 
universe  reveals,  that  he  can  understand 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


105 


the  universe,  and  with  these  powers  gath¬ 
ered  up  into  conscious  personal  unity,  and 
thus  organized  for  effective  use.  Surely 
the  natural  interpretation  of  all  this  is, 
that  in  having  personality  man  must  be 
the  finite  counterpart  of  the  mind  that 
conceived  him.  That  mind  also,  we  may 
be  sure,  must  gather  up  in  conscious  per¬ 
sonal  unity  the  powers  that  belong  to  it. 
In  man  the  old  line  of  divine  self-manifes¬ 
tation  has  not  been  abandoned,  or  diverted, 
but  extended  straight  on  in  its  old  direc¬ 
tion.  Still  does  every  gain  in  the  human 
correspond  to  something  eternal  in  the 
divine.  Personality  in  man  is  simply  a 
new  form  of  likeness  to  God’s  eternal 
being,  and  growth  in  personality  is  growth 
toward  God.  God  is  personal. 

If  this  looks  reasonable,  do  not  turn 
away  from  it  till  you  have  noticed  a  con¬ 
firmation  that  is  waiting.  It  is  found  in 
the  direction  that  was  taken  by  evolution 
when  it  came  to  man.  Up  to  man,  there 


io  6 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


proceeded  through  unmeasured  periods  a 
physical  evolution,  a  bodily  unfolding  and 
advance,  accompanied  by  a  development 
of  mental  or  psychical  powers  also.  But 
we  are  told  that  now,  when  man  has  come, 
there  are  no  signs  that  physical  advance 
is  to  proceed  further  through  his  line.  It 
does  not  appear  that  he  is  to  be  the  parent 
of  new  and  higher  physical  species,  but 
the  movement  of  evolution  has  turned  to 
the  development  of  his  spiritual  powers. 
First  came  that  which  was  natural,  then 
that  which  was  spiritual.  God  by  the 
long  process  of  life  prepared  the  human 
body,  fruit  of  patient  evolution,  fit  for 
human  uses ;  but  when  the  body  was 
ready,  the  spirit  —  if  we  may  still  use  the 
familiar  name  —  was  not  so  far  advanced, 
but  was  unformed  and  infantile.  From 
the  time  when  man  first  was  man,  God’s 
patient  process  of  evolution  forsook  the 
body,  which  it  had  now  completed,  and 
turned  its  energies  to  the  soul,  which  was 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


107 


still  in  its  early  stages.  Age  after  age,  the 
human  spirit  has  been  developing  through 
the  hard  course  of  experience.  Intelligence, 
affection,  will,  have  been  growing  strong 
and  clear,  and  have  slowly  been  gathered 
more  and  more  into  that  effective  oneness 
which  we  call  personality.  In  fact,  the 
present  work  of  evolution,  so  far  as  the 
human  individual  is  concerned,  is  the  form¬ 
ing,  training,  and  completing  of  the  per¬ 
son  ;  and  there  is  no  sign  that  any  higher 
work  is  to  be  undertaken  on  the  earth 
than  this.  The  finishing  of  the  human 
personality  is  the  highest  earthly  work 
of  God.  How  clear  and  convincing  a 
confirmation  is  this  of  the  claim  that  the 
human  person  is  the  highest  expression  and 
truest  picture  of  the  conceiving  mind,  and 
that  God,  when  we  know  him,  will  prove 
to  be  just  that  which  personality,  projected 
and  expanded  to  perfection,  would  be ! 

Yes,  the  mind  that  conceived  the  world 
has  been  personal  all  the  while,  —  personal 


io8 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


in  having  thought,  affection,  will,  all 
bound  into  conscious  self-directing  unity. 
This  personal  Being,  God,  wrought  upon 
the  world  until  he  had  brought  forth  upon 
it  man,  the  likeness  of  his  own  personal¬ 
ity,  and  then  he  turned  from  other  work 
to  train  the  human  personality  for  endless 
fellowship  with  himself.  This  is  the  pur¬ 
pose  that  unifies  human  history,  and  makes 
it  the  legitimate  continuation  of  the  great 
age-long  process  of  the  world.  In  the 
course  of  this  latest  work,  God  gave  to 
men  religion,  in  which  they  were  moved 
to  look  up  to  heaven  and  commune  with 
the  power  above  them.  It  was  his  gift, 
indeed,  and  he  did  not  forget  that  he  had 
conferred  it.  The  characteristic  word  of 
religion  in  all  ages  and  stages  of  its  life  is 
“Thou,”  a  personal  word,  a  cry  and  call 
of  the  heart  to  one  who  hears.  The  char¬ 
acteristic  word  of  religion  is  a  pronoun 
of  personal  address.  This  word  is  true. 
There  is  no  “it”  back  of  all  things  and 


DIVINE  PERSONALITY 


109 


over  all;  there  is  One  who  is  rightly  called 
“He,”  and  addressed  as  “Thou.”  The 
source  of  being  is  personal. 

“Speak  to  him  thou,  for  he  hears,  and  spirit  with 
Spirit  can  meet : 

Closer  is  he  than  breathing,  and  nearer  than 
hands  and  feet.” 

The  personal  language  of  religion  is  not 
to  be  rejected  as  false,  but  stands  as  the 
truest  language  that  the  soul  can  speak  or 
hear.  “  Thus  saith  the  high  and  lofty 
One  that  inhabiteth  eternity,  whose  name 
is  Holy:  I  dwell  in  the  high  and  holy 
place,  with  him  also  that  is  of  a  contrite 
and  humble  spirit,  to  revive  the  spirit  of 
the  humble,  and  to  revive  the  heart  of  the 
contrite  ones.”  “From  him,  and  through 
him,  and  unto  him,  are  all  things.”  This 
is  the  utterance  of  religion,  and  religion 
is  right  in  its  inextinguishable  habit  and 
practice  of  saying  “  Thou  ”  to  God.  As 
truly  as  we  are  persons,  so  truly  is  he  the 
perfect  Person. 


Ill 

THE  RELATION  BETWEEN  GOD 
AND  MEN 


% 


1 


Ill 


THE  RELATION  BETWEEN  GOD 
AND  MEN 

According  to  the  immemorial  doctrine, 
and  the  immemorial  feeling,  of  religion, 
the  relation  between  God  and  men  is  a 

4 

personal  relation.  “  Lord,  thou  hast  been 
our  dwelling-place  in  all  generations;  ”  — 
thou,  a  Person,  hast  been  to  our  spirits  as 
a  home.  “  Then  shalt  thou  call,  and  the 
Lord  will  answer:  thou  shalt  cry,  and  he 
will  say,  Here  I  am.”  Call  this  anthropo¬ 
morphic  if  you  will;  nevertheless  religion 
has  always  meant  it,  and  has  always  meant 
the  thing  that  it  expresses,  namely,  that 
man  may  say  “Thou  ”  to  God,  just  as  fitly 
and  truly  as  he  may  say  “thou”  to  his 
fellow.  The  relation  between  the  two, 
religion  assumes  and  affirms,  is  a  “Thou 
and  I  ”  relation.  Christianity  not  only 

8 


THE  RELATION 


114 


assumes  and  affirms  this  in  company  with 
all  religion  that  has  ever  been  a  comfort 
or  inspiration  to  the  heart  of  man;  it 
assumes  and  affirms  this  more  distinctly 
and  positively  than  any  other  religion  in 
the  world  has  ever  done.  “Pray  to  thy 
Father,”  said  the  Founder  of  Christianity. 
“Your  heavenly  Father  knoweth  that  ye 
have  need  of  all  these  things.” 

Our  thought  in  the  second  lecture  did  not 
move  in  the  region  of  Christian  doctrine. 
We  were  discussing  the  nature  of  person¬ 
ality,  and  seeking  to  judge  whether  the 
mind  that  is  in  the  universe  can  be  held  to 
possess  genuine  personal  powers  and  quali¬ 
ties.  We  did  not  begin  by  looking  for 
the  differences  between  that  mind  and  our 
own,  but  rather  by  asking  whether  there 
is  evidence  of  the  existence  in  that  mind, 
whatever  the  differences  of  mode  may  be, 
of  the  powers  that  we  know  as  personal. 
For  my  argument,  as  my  argument,  I 
care  nothing,  but  I  greatly  care  for  the 


BETWEEN  GOD  AND  MEN 


115 


conclusion,  and  I  should  be  very  glad  if 
those  who  listened  felt  that  it  was  easier 
to  accept  than  to  deny  the  personality  of 
God.  I  desired  to  show  that  the  powers 
that  we  call  personal  in  ourselves  are 
manifested  in  the  operations  of  the  mind 
that  expresses  itself  in  the  universe,  and 
that  in  all  sound  reason  these  powers  must 
be  regarded  as  gathered  up  into  a  con¬ 
scious  personal  unity  in  God.  I  sought 
to  present  personality  as  that  highest  form 
of  dependent  being  which  irresistibly 
argues  its  own  counterpart  as  existing  in 
the  creative  and  archetypal  Being  to 
which,  or  rather  to  whom,  we  give  the 
name  of  God.  As  I  showed  in  the  first 
lecture,  it  is  incomparably  more  free  from 
difficulties  to  believe  in  an  all-embracing 
mind  endowed  with  goodness  than  to  deny 
it.  Granted  such  a  mind,  it  is  really  no 
step  in  advance  at  all,  but  only  a  neces¬ 
sary  unfolding  of  what  is  implied  already, 
to  call  it  personal. 


THE  RELATION 


1 1 6 

If  these  positions  are  sound,  philosophy 
has  no  abiding  objection  to  the  primary 

assumption  and  assertion  of  religion. 

% 

There  is  a  Person  out  of  sight,  with  whom 
human  beings  may  sustain  personal  rela¬ 
tions.  We  are  not  compelled  to  think  of 
the  Great  Invisible  as  “It;  ”  not  until  we 
have  said  “ He,”  not  until  we  are  saying 
“Thou,”  do  we  do  justice  to  the  Great 
Invisible.  God  is  a  person.  A  person¬ 
ality  so  vast  may,  indeed,  be  to  us  un- 
picturable,  but  it  does  not  follow  that  it 
is  inconceivable.  On  the  other  hand, 
when  we  approach  the  question  through 
the  open  door  of  resemblances,  —  a  door 
opened  wider  to  us  by  the  doctrine  of  evo¬ 
lution  than  by  any  other  view  of  things 
that  was  ever  current  among  men,  —  wTe 
find  that  the  personality  of  God  is  easier 
to  believe  in  than  to  set  aside.  We  can¬ 
not  deny  it,  indeed,  without  leaving  the 
well-known  human  personality  unsup¬ 
ported  and  unaccounted  for  in  the  world. 


BETWEEN  GOD  AND  MEN 


ii  7 


So  when  religion  stands  speaking  to  some 
one  in  the  unseen  realms,  no  reason  ap¬ 
pears  for  doubting  that  there  is  some  one 
there  to  be  spoken  to.  Religion  may 
speak  unforbidden,  and  need  not  be  taxed 
with  unreasonableness,  if  it  believes  that 
its  voice  is  heard. 

When  we  inquire,  as  we  are  now  to  do, 
concerning  the  relation  that  exists  between 
God  and  men,  we  start  with  the  idea  that 
it  is  a  personal  relation.  This  is  much, 
but  we  can  go  farther,  and  make  a  more 
definite  statement.  We  can  give  a  defini¬ 
tion  that  has  support  from  both  sides  of 
our  field  of  thought,  from  the  scientific 
side  and  from  the  religious.  The  defini¬ 
tion  is  this.  The  relation  of  God  to  men 
is  a  paternal  relation,  and  the  relation  of 
men  to  God  is  a  filial  relation.  The  rela¬ 
tion  between  God  and  men  is  that  of 
Father  and  child.  This  statement  I  de¬ 
sire  now  to  expound  and  verify. 


1 1 8 


THE  RELATION 


I  said  that  the  definition  that  I  was 
about  to  offer  had  support  from  the 
scientific  side.  It  is  often  supposed,  I 
know,  that  the  doctrine  of  filial  relation 
between  men  and  God  is  purely  a  doctrine 
of  religion,  over  against  which  scientific 
thought  stands  in  criticism  if  not  in  oppo¬ 
sition.  The  impulse  to  say  44  Father  ”  is  an 
impulse  of  faith  alone,  and  has  no  support 
but  such  as  faith  affords  it.  The  belief 
that  God,  on  his  side,  thinks  the  thoughts 
of  a  fatherly  heart  toward  us,  is  assumed 
to  be  simply  the  reflex  of  our  own  relig¬ 
ious  faith,  and  to  have  no  standing  in  the 
court  of  reason  or  science.  But  I  affirm 
that  the  doctrine  of  the  filial  relation  has 
as  true  a  home  in  the  world  of  science  as 
in  the  world  of  religion.  When  we  say 
44 Father,”  we  not  only  make  a  venture  of 
faith;  we  speak  according  to  the  facts. 
If  we  did  not  speak  according  to  the  facts, 
the  venture  of  faith  would  be  destined  to 
end,  sooner  or  later,  in  collapse  and  wreck. 


BETWEEN  GOD  AND  MEN  1 19 

« 

But  we  need  have  no  fear  of  this,  for  facts 
and  faith  agree  in  their  testimony  as  to  the 
relation  between  God  and  men. 

The  proof  that  I  shall  offer  here  is  very 
short  and  simple.  Consent,  with  me,  to 
accept  the  conclusions  that  have  been  al¬ 
ready  reached.  Take  it  for  true,  that  we 
are  indeed  obliged  to  believe  in  a  mind 
which  has  thought  existence  through,  and 
is  expressing  itself  in  the  things  that  come 
to  pass  in  the  universe.  Grant  that  there 
exists  a  conceiving  mind  according  to 
whose  conception  the  universe  proceeds. 
That  mind,  of  course,  is  rational ;  we  can¬ 
not  leave  this  out  of  our  thoughts,  as  we 
have  seen,  without  leaving  our  thoughts 
themselves  all  unsupported  and  untrust¬ 
worthy.  That  mind  is  essentially  personal, 
knowing,  loving,  and  willing,  as  really  as 
we,  though  in  modes  differing  from  ours 
and  partly  beyond  our  ken.  That  mind 
is  good  also;  we  cannot  deny  it,  as  we 
have  seen,  without  leaving  all  known  good- 


120 


THE  RELATION 


ness  unsupported  and  uncertain,  and  dis¬ 
crediting  all  our  religion  and  ethics.  Take 
it  for  true,  then,  that  there  is  a  conceiving 
mind  which  is  rationally  conducting  the 
long  enterprise  of  the  unfolding  universe. 
Accept  only  this,  and  see  what  follows. 

In  the  long  process  of  things  this  con¬ 
ceiving  mind  has  brought  man  into  exist¬ 
ence.  That  is  the  same  as  to  say  that  God 
has  created  man,  —  the  process  and  method 
of  his  doing  so  being  unimportant  in  com¬ 
parison  with  the  fact.  To  say  that  the 
conceiving  mind,  personal,  rational,  spirit¬ 
ual,  brought  into  existence  man,  personal, 
rational,  spiritual,  is  the  same  as  to  say 
that  God  created  man  in  his  own  image. 
Every  man,  so  far  as  he  possesses  the 
powers  of  a  rational  and  moral  being,  bears 
the  likeness  of  God,  to  whom  he  owes  his 
existence.  Wherever  there  is  a  man,  there 
God  has  brought  into  existence  one  who 
is  like  himself.  That  is  what  constitutes 
parenthood,  as,  in  view  of  the  common  rela^- 


BETWEEN  GOD  AND  MEN 


1 2 1 


tions  of  life,  we  define  the  term.  When 
the  conceiving  Spirit  has  brought  into  be¬ 
ing  persons  like  himself,  it  is  not  by  mere 
accommodation  of  terms,  it  is  scarcely 
even  by  metaphor,  that  he  is  called  their 
Father.  If  it  seems  ihat  this  name  must 
be  considered  figurative,  then  tell  me  by 
what  literal  name  I  shall  set  forth  the 
actual  relation.  To  call  him  their  Creator 
is  to  speak  in  truth;  but  tho  name  is  in¬ 
adequate,  for  the  same  conceiving  mind 
has  conceived  the  solar  system  and  brought 
it  into  being.  He  is  Creator  of  the  solar 
system,  but  the  solar  system  does  not  bear 
the  likeness  of  his  power  to  know,  to  love, 
and  to  will,  as  you  and  I  do.  What  is 
the  name  that  expresses  the  relation  of  the 
great  Source  of  all  to  you  and  me,  as 
different  from  his  relation  to  the  solar 
system,  which  cannot  think  and  feel  and 
will?  What,  but  Father?  What  word 
sets  forth  the  peculiar  relation  of  created 
personal  beings  to  him,  but  son  ?  He  has 


122 


THE  RELATION 


produced  us  men,  and  we  are  like  him  in 
the  essential  elements  of  the  personal  con¬ 
stitution,  So  we  are  his  offspring,  and 
he  is  our  Father.  In  these  sentences  I 
have  used  the  word  “God;  ”  but  I  am  not 
thinking  as  yet  of  the  God  of  religion,  the 
God  and  Father  of  Jesus  Christ.  My 
point  is,  that  the  originative  Spirit,  whose 
powers  and  qualities  are  manifested  in  the 
evolution  of  the  world,  has  at  last  brought 
forth  spirits  in  his  own  likeness,  and  that 
this  makes  him  their  Father,  and  them 
his  children.  To  all  rational  beings 
everywhere,  the  conceiving  and  origina¬ 
tive  rational  Being  is  Father. 

And  I  do  not  see  why  we  are  not  to 
give  this  name,  even  in  this  connection, 
its  proper  spiritual  significance,  which  is 
that  a  father  cares  for  his  offspring.  It  is 
often  assumed,  I  know,  from  various  points 
of  view,  that  an  evolving  universe  must  be 
the  home  of  eternal  indifference  and  un¬ 
responsiveness.  Even  if  there  is  a  mind' 


BETWEEN  GOD  AND  MEN  1 23 


in  it,  there  is  no  heart ;  no  evidence  exists 
that  the  God  of  evolution,  if  there  is  such 
a  God,  takes  the  slightest  interest  in  his 
creatures.  All  is  steady,  impartial,  pas¬ 
sionless  in  his  operation,  and  a  man  is  to 
him  simply  like  a  rock  or  an  apple-tree,  — 
one  of  the  products  of  his  mighty  move¬ 
ment,  now  here  but  soon  vanished,  and  mak¬ 
ing  no  appeal  to  him.  But  let  us  put  our 
common  sense  upon  the  question.  Suppose 
only  that  there  is  a  spirit,  rational  and 
kindly,  who  thinks  the  movement  through, 
and  understands  it,  and  carries  it  forward. 
In  this  world,  of  which  we  are  specially 
thinking,  it  is  a  long,  long  movement. 
After  the  material  mass  has  become  dif¬ 
ferentiated,  so  that  a  planet  has  found  its 
orbit,  millions  of  times  does  the  planet 
swing  round  its  central  orb  before  any 
rational  soul  looks  out  from  it  toward 
the  sun.  But  it  does  come  to  pass  at 
length,  that  spirits  similar  in  constitution 
and  powers  to  the  creative  Spirit  are  liv- 


124 


THE  RELATION 


ing  on  the  earth,  —  spirits  capable  of  think¬ 
ing  his  thoughts  after  him,  of  bearing  his 
moral  character,  and  of  growing  up  to  full 
personality  in  his  likeness,  and  to  fellow¬ 
ship  with  his  heart.  Every  spirit  of  them 
is  born  an  infant,  and  the  race  of  them  is 
born  in  infancy,  too ;  all  is  rudimentary  at 
first,  and  yet  the  powers  and  possibilities 
are  there,  and  the  career  of  personal  exist¬ 
ence  has  been  opened,  with  all  its  risks 
and  glories.  As  the  planet  courses  on 
around  the  sun,  it  becomes  apparent,  in 
process  of  time,  that  the  movement  of 
physical  evolution  has  paused  at  man,  so 
that  higher  forms  of  bodily  structure  are 
not  brought  forth  from  him,  and  the  main 
work  of  evolution  henceforth  proceeds  in 
the  realm  of  his  spirit,  through  the  build¬ 
ing  up  of  his  personality,  and  the  develop¬ 
ing  of  the  powers  in  which  he  resembles 
the  creative  intelligence.  And  do  you 
think  that  the  creative  intelligence  takes 
no  interest  in  the  presence  of  this  his  own 


BE  TWEEN  GOD  AND  MEN  1 25 


miniature  but  growing  counterpart  in  the 
world?  To  deny  the  interest  of  the  crea¬ 
tive  intelligence  in  his  own  spiritual  kin¬ 
dred,  brought  forth  by  his  OAvn  long 
process,  is  to  deny  the  existence  of  crea¬ 
tive  intelligence  altogether,  and  go  back 
to  the  fathomless  difficulties  of  a  mindless 
world.  If  man  is  not  cared  for  from  above 
and  beneath  and  around  himself,  by  the 
spirit  that  brought  man  forth  in  his  own 
likeness,  we  shall  be  compelled  to  infer  that 
there  is  no  such  spirit.  Grant  intelligence, 
and  you  are  compelled  to  grant  affection¬ 
ate  interest  in  kindred  intelligence.  Grant 
creative  intelligence,  and  you  will  sooner 
or  later  find  yourself  recognizing  a  pater¬ 
nal  interest  of  that  intelligence  in  its 
spiritual  offspring.  The  Fatherhood  of 
God  is  a  doctrine  of  evolutionary  philoso¬ 
phy,  just  as  truly  as  it  is  a  doctrine  of 
Christianity;  and  I  am  only  foretelling 
the  certain  future,  when  I  say  that  it  will 
hereafter  be  recognized  as  such.  The  doc- 


126 


THE  RELATION 


trine  is  not  so  rich  there  as  it  is  in  Chris¬ 
tianity,  for  evolutionary  philosophy  does 
not  know  so  much  of  God  as  Christianity 
knows ;  hut  the  doctrine  is  present  in  both, 
as  a  description  of  the  existing  relation. 
The  Christian  teaching  concerning  the 
relation  between  God  and  man  —  the  doc¬ 
trine  that  this  is  a  relation  of  father  and 
child  —  is  not  a  specialty ;  it  is  grounded 
in  the  reality  of  facts  that  are  ascertain¬ 
able  outside  the  special  field  of  Chris¬ 
tianity,  and  is  thereby  confirmed  to  us  as 
true. 

I  am  thus  led  up  to  the  discussion  of 
the  Christian  teaching  on  the  relation  be¬ 
tween  God  and  men.  But  here  I  am 
met  by  question,  if  not  by  contradiction. 
Have  I  the  right  to  say,  as  I  have  been 
saying,  that  Christianity  represents  this 
relation  as  a  relation  between  Father  and 
children?  Is  the  statement  true?  If  we 
inquire  for  the  thought  that  has  histori- 


BETWEEN  GOD  AND  MEN  \2J 


cally  entered  into  the  Christian  teaching, 
we  must  admit  that  other  ideas  have  been 
present,  and  have  been  more  prominent 
than  this.  The  simple  and  noble  relation 
that  is  wrought  into  the  nature  of  human¬ 
ity  has  been  overlooked,  and  the  relations 
that  correspond  to  institutions  in  human 
society  have  been  preferred  to  them  for 
purposes  of  illustration.  The  relation  of 
a  king  to  his  subjects  has  been  most  com¬ 
monly  used  as  illustrative  of  the  relation 
that  God  sustains  to  us.  From  unmeas¬ 
ured  prehistoric  ages,  the  habit  of  looking 
up  to  chieftains  and  kings  has  been  with 
mankind.  When  the  thought  of  God  be¬ 
came  clear,  and  it  was  felt  that  God  is 
one  alone,  it  was  natural,  and  inevitable, 
that  he  should  be  set  in  the  place  of  the 
kings,  and  regarded  as  the  one  almighty 
and  worthy  sovereign.  “The  Lord  reign- 
eth,”  “The  Lord  is  a  great  king,”  “His 
kingdom  is  over  all,”  —  these  were  natural 
utterances  of  reverence  toward  the  one 


128 


THE  RELATION 


Supreme,  whom  men  were  beginning  to 
recognize.  Later,  men  could  talk  of  the 
divine  right  of  kings,  as  if  God,  the  king 
first  known,  had  authorized  the  human 
kings  to  reign  after  the  likeness  of  his  sov¬ 
ereignty;  but  if  the  earlier  history  could 
be  thoroughly  analyzed,  it  would  be  found 
more  accurate  to  speak  of  the  regal  right 
of  God,  formulated  in  human  thought 
after  the  likeness  of  human  sovereignty. 
The  first-known  kings  were  human,  and 
the  glorious  sovereignty  of  the  one  God 
was  received  as  an  inference  from  their 
relations  to  their  subjects.  This  govern¬ 
mental  analogy  was  useful.  It  was  very 
largely  true,  and  was  profoundly  instruc¬ 
tive.  But  it  could  not  be  known  in  the 
days  of  kingship  that  royalty,  age-long 
though  its  period  might  be,  was  only  an 
episode  in  the  long  history  of  human 
kind  which  was  created  for  brotherhood. 
Nevertheless,  such  is  the  fact.  Thrones 
might  stand  for  a  while,  and  regal 


BETWEEN  GOD  AND  MEN  1 29 


rights  might  seem  everlasting,  and  sov¬ 
ereignty  might  appear  to  be  the  final  word 
by  which  to  represent  the  relation  of  God 
to  men.  Yet  royalty  was  a  normal  thing 
in  human  society  only  for  a  time,  and  was 
absolutely  certain  to  yield,  as  it  is  yielding 
in  our  day,  to  institutions  that  have  their 
ground  in  human  equality  and  brother¬ 
hood.  Kingship  marks  a  long  stage  in 
human  evolution,  and  yet  a  temporary 
one;  it  cannot,  therefore,  be  the  type  of 
the  abiding  and  eternal  relation  between 
God  and  men.  And  all  the  while,  there 
was  existing  by  the  side  of  royalty  another 
relation,  not  arbitrary,  not  established,  not 
variable,  not  temporary;  a  relation  built 
into  the  very  existence  of  humanity  and 
essential  to  its  continuance;  a  relation, 
indeed,  that  is  the  very  means  of  the  con¬ 
tinued  existence  of  humanity,  and  is  there¬ 
fore  the  very  counterpart  of  the  relation 
of  God  the  creative  Spirit  to  his  spiritual 
creatures.  The  parental  relation  is  natu- 


130 


THE  RELATION 


ral,  permanent,  unchanging,  indispensable, 
and  is  by  its  nature  the  truest  analogue 
that  can  exist  to  the  relation  between  God 
and  men.  It  was  not  until  the  period  of 
kingly  institutions  had  spent  itself,  that 
the  truth  about  fatherhood  could  become 
deeply  effective  in  the  thought  of  men 
concerning  God.  But  when  once  its  fit¬ 
ness  has  been  discerned,  and  the  paternal 
idea  has  taken  the  place  that  belongs  to 
it,  behold,  there  is  thenceforth  no  return 
to  institutional  illustrations  and  temporary 
forms  of  thought.  Here  the  abiding  has 
been  reached.  There  exists  and  can  exist 
neither  institution  nor  relation  that  can 
supersede  fatherhood  in  setting  forth  the 
relation  between  God  and  men,  save  as 
fatherhood  comes  to  be  interpreted  as  in¬ 
cluding  the  entire  range  of  the  parental, 
and  the  fulness  of  the  motherly  is  gath¬ 
ered  in  with  the  fulness  of  the  fatherly,  to 
represent  what  our  God  is  to  us,  and  what 
we  are  to  him. 


BETWEEN  GOD  AND  MEN  13  I 

It  is  not  surprising,  therefore,  that  when 
in  Jesus  Christ  the  living  God  makes  an 
intentional  expression  and  representation 
of  himself  to  men,  we  find  at  the  forefront 
the  conception  of  his  fatherhood.  “  When 
ye  pray,”  says  Jesus  to  his  disciples,  “say, 
Our  Father  who  art  in  heaven.”  “Pray 
to  thy  Father  who  is  in  secret.”  “Your 
Father  knoweth  what  things  ye  have  need 
of,  before  ye  ask  him.”  “  Ye  shall  he  per¬ 
fect,  as  your  Father  is  perfect.”  “If  ye, 
being  evil,  know  how  to  give  good  gifts  to 
your  children,  how  much  more  shall  your 
Father  which  is  in  heaven  give  good 
things  to  them  that  ask  him?”  And  in 
the  personal  life  of  Jesus  his  teaching 
found  rich  and  illuminative  illustration, 
for  it  was  his  glory  that  he  fully  lived 
the  filial  life  with  God  as  Father,  and 
thus  showed  the  world  what  the  relation  is. 
“O  my  Father,”  he  said,  in  his  hour  of 
agony,  “  if  it  be  possible,  let  this  cup  pass 
away  from  me :  nevertheless,  not  as  I  will, 


132 


THE  RELATION 


but  as  thou  wilt.”  By  example  and  by 
precept  alike,  he  taught  us  to  look  up  to 
God  and  say  “Father.” 

It  is  true,  at  the  same  time,  that  Jesus 
made  much  use  of  the  kingly  language. 
The  mention  of  the  kingdom  of  God  was 
frequently  upon  his  lips,  and  many  of  his 
parables  illustrated  the  nature  and  move¬ 
ment  of  that  kingdom.  Thus  we  find  him 
speaking,  with  abundant  emphasis,  both  of 
the  kingly  and  of  the  fatherly  in  the  rela¬ 
tion  of  God  to  men.  All  this  is  immensely 
interesting  and  significant.  Upon  him  the 
ends  of  the  ages  were  met,  —  the  close  of 
the  kingly  age  and  the  opening  of  the 
paternal.  The  kingly  conception  of  God 
was  retiring,  though  it  still  had  a  long 
course  to  run  before  it  would  be  gone; 
the  paternal  conception  was  entering, 
though  it  still  had  long  to  wait  for  full 
admission.  He  spoke  in  terms  of  the  idea 
that  was  familiar  to  his  hearers,  and  at 
the  same  time  he  spoke  in  terms  of  the 


BETWEEN  GOD  AND  MEN 


133 


idea  that  was  to  supersede  it  through  his 
influence.  He  spoke  of  kingship,  which 
was  vanishing  away,  and  he  spoke  of 
fatherhood,  which  was  the  coming  idea 
because  it  was  the  truer  and  the  eternal. 
And  it  is  immensely  interesting,  also,  to 
note  the  history  of  the  two  ideas  after  his 
departure.  When  we  come  to  the  Epis¬ 
tles,  which  record  the  thought  of  the 
Christian  generation  that  followed  him, 
we  find  that  the  idea  of  the  kingdom  has 
almost  wholly  departed.  The  phrase  now 
and  then  occurs,  and  the  idea  of  sover¬ 
eignty  remains,  not  to  be  set  at  the  front, 
but  to  be  interpreted  in  the  light  of  the 
new  realities  of  experience ;  but  the  regal 
idea  of  God,  so  prominent  in  the  Hebrew 
Psalms,  holds  sway  no  longer.  The  fam¬ 
ily  idea  now  prevails.  “We  have  not 
received  the  spirit  of  bondage,  again  unto 
fear,  hut  we  have  received  the  spirit  of 
adoption,  whereby  we  cry,  Abba,  Father.” 
“Ye  are  all  sons  of  God,  through  faith, 


134 


THE  RELATION 


in  Christ  Jesus.”  Hence  the  old  title  of 
address,  “Brothers,”  not  unknown  else¬ 
where,  obtains  new  significance  and  rich¬ 
ness  in  Christianity.  The  Father  makes 
the  family,  and  the  Christians  find  them¬ 
selves  to  be  brothers  in  the  household  of 
God.  The  change  from  the  kingly  con¬ 
ception  of  God  to  the  paternal  was  only 
initiated  in  the  apostolic  age,  and  has  been 
but  slowly  going  forward  from  then  till  now. 
Even  yet  it  is  stoutly  opposed  by  many 
Christians,  partly  from  a  spirit  of  humble 
reverence  toward  God  himself,  whom  they 
think  it  morally  dangerous  to  regard  in  so 
familiar  a  light  as  the  paternal  relation 
would  suggest.  Nevertheless,  the  transi¬ 
tion  is  bound  to  go  on  and  be  completed, 
for  it  is  a  transition  from  a  lower  to  a 
higher  conception  of  God,  from  a  lower  to 
a  higher  conception  of  man,  from  an  insti¬ 
tutional  to  a  natural  illustration  of  the 
relation  between  God  and  men,  and  from  a 
temporary  to  an  eternal  fitness  in  thought. 


BETWEEN’  GOD  AND  MEN 


135 


In  such  a  case  who  can  doubt  that  the 
paternal  conception  of  God  is  the  concep¬ 
tion  to  which  belongs  the  Christian  future  ? 

But  this  statement  is  not  final,  for  it  is 
still  ambiguous,  and  Christian  teachers 
are  not  agreed  as  to  its  meaning.  To 
whom  is  God  Father?  and  who  are  God’s 
children?  Upon  these  questions  the  Chris- 
tion  people  have  not  yet  come  to  agreement. 
Two  views  divide  the  field.  Some  will  tell 
us,  without  hesitation,  that  God  is  Father 
to  all  men,  and  all  men  are  sons  to  God. 
Others  will  dissent.  They  remember  that 
special  form  of  sonship  to  God  which 
appears  in  the  New  Testament  as  intro¬ 
duced  through  the  Christian  experience, 
and  will  affirm  that  this  and  this  alone 
is  sonship.  God  is  Father  to  Christians 
only.  Of  course  he  is  Creator  to  all,  but 
Fatherhood  is  solely  a  Christian  relation. 
These  ‘are  the  two  positions,  —  God’s 
Fatherhood  is  natural,  and  universal; 


136 


THE  RELATION 


God’s  Fatherhood  is  spiritual  or  religious, 
and  therefore  limited. 

Between  the  two  views  there  is  not  only 
difference,  but  controversy.  Each  side 
sadly  wonders  at  the  other,  and  feels  that 
the  other  is  sacrificing  something  essential 
to  Christianity.  Believers  in  the  universal 
Fatherhood  declare  that  those  who  deny  it 
put  an  unchristian  limitation  upon  God, 
denying  the  breadth  of  his  grace,  and 
making  him  less  than  perfect  in  his  rela¬ 
tion  to  his  creatures.  Those  on  the  other 
side  declare  that  believers  in  the  universal 
Fatherhood  do  injustice  to  the  eternal 
claim  of  ethics  and  religion.  There  can 
be  nothing  higher,  they  say,  than  sonship 
to  God,  and  to  proclaim  this  as  the  natural 
birthright  of  all  men  indiscriminately  is 
to  confound  moral  distinctions  and  ignore 
moral  necessities.  It  is  to  lower  the  claim 
of  God’s  character,  and  encourage  men  in 
their  indifference  to  goodness.  Thus  it 
has  come  to  pass  that  even  the  gracious 


BETWEEN  GOD  AND  MEN 


137 


and  inspiring  fact  of  divine  Fatherhood 
is  a  matter  of  sharp  discussion.  It  is  a 
sad  fact,  and  yet  we  cannot  wonder  at  it. 
The  division  is  a  sharp  one,  and  very  seri¬ 
ous.  It  would  be  a  sad  thing  to  put 
an  unchristian  limitation  upon  God,  and 
misrepresent  his  relation  to  his  creatures 
by  making  it  too  narrow ;  and  it  would  be 
an  equally  sad  thing  to  diminish  the  claim 
of  the  eternal  character,  and  encourage  the 
belief  that  God  regards  the  good  and  the 
bad  alike.  I  do  not  wonder  that  in  this 
controversy  each  side  seems  to  the  other 
to  be  bitterly  wrong.  At  least,  I  do  not 
wonder  that  this  is  so,  as  long  as  there 
exists  a  controversy  in  the  case,  and  dis¬ 
putants  misunderstand  each  other’s  posi¬ 
tion  after  the  manner  of  disputants.  In 
fact,  both  sides  are  right.  The  two  posi¬ 
tions  fit  together  perfectly,  when  they  are 
rightly  understood,  and  there  ought  to  be 
no  controversy. 

When  I  spoke,  a  little  while  ago,  of 


138 


THE  RELATION 


finding  a  good  doctrine  of  divine  Father¬ 
hood  in  the  evolutionary  philosophy,  it 
was  evident  that  I  had  in  mind  a  universal 
fatherhood,  —  a  natural  relation  between 
God  and  men,  which  belongs  to  all  spirits 
who  have  derived  and  dependent  exist¬ 
ence.  I  affirmed  sonship  for  all  who  are 
brought  forth  in  the  likeness  of  the  Crea¬ 
tor’s  spiritual  being.  This  I  affirm,  with¬ 
out  the  slightest  hesitation.  I  am  sure 
that  this  relation  is  in  a  most  real  sense  a 
relation  of  parent  and  offspring,  father  and 
child.  Such  sonship  is  of  course  inde¬ 
structible.  The  relation  of  God  to  all 
created  spirits  is  essentially,  and  from  the 
terms  of  the  case,  a  paternal  relation,  so 
called  not  by  fiction,  and  scarcely  even  by 
metaphor,  but  in  plain  truth.  This  is  the 
position  in  which  created  spirits  stand 
and  must  stand,  unalterably,  in  reference 
to  him  who  produced  them  in  his  own 
likeness  as  spiritual  beings.  This  relation 
is  the  indispensable  foundation  of  all  ex- 


BETWEEN  GOD  AND  MEN  139 


perimental  forms  of  sonship  in  the  life  of 
men.  First  of  all,  God  is  Father  to  men, 
and  men  are  sons  to  God,  from  the  very 
fact  that  he  made  them,  and  made  them 
like  himself.  This  is  a  truth  that  no  one 
ought  to  question. 

But  it  does  not  follow  that  the  divine 
Fatherhood  is  realized  in  its  full  meaning 
in  the  lives  of  all  his  children,  or  that  his 
sons  are  living  as  sons  to  him  at  all.  All 
men  are  God’s  offspring,  as  Paul  approv¬ 
ingly  quoted  from  the  Greek  poet,  and  are 
entitled  to  the  blessings  of  sonship  to  him. 
God  is  Father  to  all  men,  but  not  all  men 
have  to  do  with  him  in  their  hearts  as 
Father.  All  men  are  sons  to  God,  but 
not  all  men  are  living  as  sons  ought. 
There  is  an  experience  in  which  sonship  is 
fulfilled ;  and  that  is  the  higher  thing  that 
the  New  Testament  tells  of.  A  man  who 
is  a .  son  of  God  by  nature,  may  enter 
into  his  sonship,  and  become  a  son  of 
God  in  conscious  relation  and  character. 


140 


THE  RELATION 


Yes,  this  is  a  case  in  which  one  who 
was  born  a  son  may,  nevertheless,  be¬ 
come  a  son;  or  rather,  this  is  a  case  in 
which  one  who  was  born  a  son  may  there¬ 
fore  become  a  son.  The  relation  to  which 
he  was  born  may  become  to  him  what  it 
ought  to  be,  and  the  meaning  of  divine 
Fatherhood,  unknown  to  him  before,  may 
be  revealed  in  his  experience  and  made 
real  in  his  life. 

Paul  and  Nero,  for  example,  are  sons  to 
God,  brought  into  existence  by  him  in  his 
likeness.  But  Paul  and  Nero  do  not  stand 
before  us  in  their  history  as  equally  sons 
to  God.  To  one  the  relation  is  not  only 
unknown,  but  worse  than  blank,  for  he 
loves  the  evil  that  his  Father  hates,  and 
lacks  the  essential  elements  of  his  Father’s 
character.  The  other  knows  who .  his 
Father  is,  knows  of  what  sort  he  is,  loves 
him,  delights  in  his  character,  chooses  to 
be  like  him,  and  is  living  at  home  with 
God  as  a  loyal  child.  God  is  true  to  the 


BETWEEN  GOD  AND  MEN  1 41 


relation  which  his  creatorship  involves, 
and  toward  Paul  and  Nero  alike  his  heart 
is  unchangingly  paternal.  Both  are  God’s 
offspring.  But  in  one  the  natural  kin¬ 
ship  to  God  has  ripened  into  moral  and 
spiritual  kinship,  while  in  the  other  the 
natural  relation  to  God  stands  unrealized, 
unquickened,  unperceived,  and  is  daily 
sinned  against.  Deep  and  radical  are  the 
differences  between  the  two  men,  and  deep 
and  radical  are  the  differences  between  the 
sonships  that  they  are  actually  in  posses¬ 
sion  of.  The  original  fact  of  sonship  to 
God  is  the  same  to  both,  and  yet  see  two 
sonships  actually  existing,  heaven-wide 
apart  in  moral  significance.  One  of  the 
born  children  has  become  true  child  to 
the  real  Father,  and  the  other  has  not. 

Do  I  need  to  say  more  ?  Is  it  not  plain  ? 
All  that  I  need  to  do,  I  think,  is  to  dwell 
for  a  moment  upon  what  the  fulfilment  of 
the  natural  sonship  consists  in.  That  son- 
ship  to  God  into  which  all  men  are  born 


142 


THE  RELATION 


is  not  complete  when  they  are  born,  for 
it  is  intended  to  be  spiritual  as  well  as 
natural.  It  is  not  complete  so  long  as 
they  are  ignorant  of  their  Father,  or  in¬ 
different  to  their  Father.  It  is  not  com¬ 
plete  so  long  as  they  are  bad  men.  The 
completion  of  sonsliip  to  God  consists  in 
religion  and  in  moral  excellence.  The 
two  are  closely  connected;  religion  is  re¬ 
lation  to  the  Father,  and  moral  excellence 
is  likeness  to  the  Father.  What  can  be 
plainer  than  that  in  these  the  normal 
sonship  is  attained,  and  the  natural  son- 
ship  becomes  what  it  ought  to  be? 

So  it  may  well  come  to  pass  that  one 
who  is  born  to  be  a  son  shall  enter  upon 
the  life  of  sonship,  and  shall  practically 
for  the  first  time  become  a  son.  He  takes 
the  child’s  place;  he  makes  his  own  the 
filial  spirit;  he  lives  in  spiritual  fellowship 
with  the  holy  One,  who  is  his  Father;  he 
conducts  himself  as  a  loyal  son  to  God. 
All  this  is  new  in  his  life.  Call  the  begin- 


BETWEEN  GOD  AND  MEN  1 43 


ning  of  it  a  new  birth;  say  that  he  has 
become  a  child  of  God :  you  will  be  speak¬ 
ing  truly.  And  yet  you  will  be  saying 
nothing  contrary  to  the  claim  that  God 
was  always  his  Father,  and  he  was  always 
God’s  child,  for  this  completed  sonship 
is  only  what  he  was  born  for.  He  has 
now  come  to  himself,  and  entered  into  his 
own,  and  received  the  portion  that  belongs 
to  the  son  of  such  a  father.  The  natural 
sonship  is  now  coming  to  its  proper  spirit¬ 
ual  completion.  The  filial  life,  such  as 
Christ  tells  of,  is  the  only  normal  life  of 
man,  and  the  Christian  relation  to  God  is 
the  only  normal  human  relation. 

The  two  sonships,  natural  and  spiritual, 
universal  and  special,  are  the  two  sides 
of  the  shield.  "Why  need  there  be  any 
further  discussion  about  them?  We  can¬ 
not  lose  our  natural  sonship,  but  our  spir¬ 
itual  sonship,  which  is  the  crown  of  the 
natural,  we  cannot  possess  at  all,  except  as, 
through  his  action  and  our  own,  we  come 


144 


THE  RELATION 


home  in  loyal  fellowship  to  our  Father. 
Here  is  no  limiting  God’s  loving  and  faith¬ 
ful  relation  to  his  creatures,  and  here  is 
no  setting  good  men  and  bad  on  one  level 
in  his  paternal  favor.  If  I  could  lift  my 
voice  so  that  all  Christian  people  could 
hear  it,  I  would  say  to  them,  Cease  from 
your  strife  over  the  divine  fatherhood. 
Recognize  the  universal  sweep  of  his  natu¬ 
ral  and  unalterable  paternity,  and  believe 
that  it  is  a  paternity  full  of  holy  love. 
Recognize  also  the  moral  exactingness  of 
this  natural  paternity,  and  perceive  that 
its  full  meaning  can  be  realized  only  in  that 
spiritual  family  relation  of  which  Christ 
is  the  mediator. 

Having  spoken  thus  of  Fatherhood  and 
sonship,  we  are  ready  for  a  comprehensive 
statement  of  the  relation  between  God  and 
man.  Dare  I  make  one?  Yes;  for,  imper¬ 
fect  though  it  is,  I  am  sure  that  what  I  am 
about  to  say  is  true.  Here  it  is.  God  is 


BETWEEN'  GOD  AND  MEN  1 45 


the  source  of  the  being  of  men.  He  has 
brought  them  into  existence  in  his  own  like¬ 
ness,  and  is  a  Father  to  them,  in  fact  and  in 
feeling.  He  owns  them,  and  owns  his  re¬ 
sponsibility  for  them.  He  cares  for  them. 
He  is  worthy  of  their  love  and  confidence, 
and  his  will  for  them  is  a  will  for  their 
goodness.  Men  are  horn  his  sons,  and  can 
become  their  true  selves  only  by  becoming 
his  sons  indeed,  in  moral  and  religious 
fellowship  with  him.  Since  they  are  his 
sons  by  birth,  he  desires  them  to  be  his 
sons  in  fellowship  and  character,  and  is 
satisfied  with  them  only  as  they  are  giving 
themselves  to  the  filial  life. 

I  am  sure  that  this  statement  is  true, 
for  it  accords  with  what  we  learn  of  God 
from  the  order  of  the  world  and  in  the 
revelations  of  Christianity.  The  world  of 
such  a  Father-God  is  the  world  that  we 
live  in ;  and  the  more  we  know,  the  more 
shall  we  find  it  so.  And  yet  I  know  very 
well  that  mystery,  perhaps  to  us  at  present 


10 


146 


THE  RELATION 


insoluble,  attends  this  answer  to  our  ques¬ 
tion,  as  well  as  any  other  answer  that 
might  be  given.  I  stand  in  awe  when  I 
speak  of  the  relation  of  God  to  all  men, 
and  declare  it  to  be  unquestionably  a 
paternal  relation,  so  vast  and  mysterious 
to  me  is  that  little  word  “all,”  which  I 
am  constrained  to  use.  Too  long  have  we 
been  narrow  and  provincial  in  our  con¬ 
ceptions  of  humanity,  talking  almost  as  if 
Jews  and  Christians  made  up  the  human¬ 
ity  that  stood  in  close  relations  to  God. 
The  time  has  come  when  by  “all”  we 
must  mean  all.  We  must  contemplate  the 
relation  of  God  to  the  entire  race  of  men 
that  he  has  brought  into  existence,  and  to 
all  the  individuals  that  compose  it.  We 
must  not  leave  multitudes  in  forgetfulness. 
In  “all  men,”  we  must  include  the  first 
really  human  beings  that  ever  lived,  and 
all  the  prehistoric  race,  and  all  the  gener¬ 
ations  of  humanity  in  all  the  nations  of  the 
earth,  and  all  that  are  to  follow,  as  long  as 


BETWEEN  GOD  AND  MEN 


mankind  shall  exist.  Our  present  inquiry 
concerns  the  relation  of  God  to  all  of 
these,  and  of  all  of  these  to  him.  Only 
too  well  do  I  know  what  vast  unanswered 
questions,  and  questions  perhaps  to  us 
unanswerable,  lie  waiting  for  us,  however 
we  may  define  this  relation.  But  I  cannot 
change  or  withhold  my  definition  because 
of  this  condition  of  things,  for  I  know  and 
am  sure  that  the  definition  that  I  have 
given  of  the  relation  between  God  and 
man  must  be  substantially  correct.  It  cor¬ 
responds  to  what  I  am  sure  of,  concerning 
the  God  of  the  creation,  in  whose  likeness 
and  at  whose  call  the  entire  humanity  has 
come  forth  to  being ;  and  it  corresponds  to 
what  has  been  made  plain  to  us  by  Jesus 
Christ,  in  whom  God  revealed  himself  to 
men.  We  cannot  reasonably  or  rever¬ 
ently  think  otherwise  than  that  God,  the 
source  of  humanity,  is  Father  to  men  in 
fact  and  feeling,  acknowledges  his  pater¬ 
nity  of  them,  cares  for  them,  and  desires 


148 


THE  RELATION 


their  good;  and  that  men,  born  for  the 
filial  life,  come  to  themselves  and  their 
own  when  they  enter  the  life  of  voluntary 
sonship  to  their  holy  Father,  and  only 
then.  This  must  be  true  of  men  as  men, 
or  rather  of  men  as  spiritual  beings,  no 
matter  when  or  where  they  live,  or  what 
their  stage  of  development  may  be.  Im¬ 
possible  though  it  may  be  to  answer  the 
questions  that  come  with  such  a  state¬ 
ment,  still  it  is  impossible  that  the  truth 
should  be  radically  different  from  this. 

Here  many  lines  of  thought  open  before 
me,  but  there  are  two  that  have  vital  im¬ 
portance.  Of  the  significance  and  effect 
of  the  relation  between  God  and  men  in 
the  realm  of  ethics,  I  intend  to  speak  in 
the  next  lecture.  Let  me  speak  a  few 
words  now  upon  the  significance  and  effect 
of  this  relation  in  the  realm  of  religion. 

In  the  light  of  the  relation  that  exists 
between  God  and  men,  we  see  at  a  glance 


BETWEEN  GOD  AND  MEN  1 49 


what  place  belongs  to  religion  in  the 
life  of  humanity.  Here  we  have  such  a 
relation  of  man  to  God  as  that  religion  is 
obviously  normal  and  necessary  to  man¬ 
kind.  Whatever  is  human,  was  made  for 
religion;  that  is  plain.  Religion  is  the 
life  and  experience  of  the  human  soul  in 
relation  to  higher  spiritual  Being,  upon 
which  it  is  dependent.  To  this  brief  defi¬ 
nition  we  might  add  other  elements  if  we 
wished  to  define  closely;  but  this,  which 
touches  the  heart  of  the  matter,  is  a  defi¬ 
nition  that  suffices  for  the  present  purpose. 
The  idea  of  religion  implies  that  there  is 
some  higher  spiritual  Being,  with  which 
—  or,  as  we  might  just  as  well  say,  with 
whom  —  the  spirit  of  man  can  hold  inter¬ 
course.  If  there  is  no  spiritual  being 
higher  than  man,  of  course  religion  ceases 
to  be.  But  if  there  is  a  spiritual  Being, 
the  conceiver  and  creator  of  all,  from 
whom  man’s  being  is  derived,  and  from 
whom  there  comes  forth  upon  man  a  genu- 


150 


THE  RELATION 


ine  paternal  interest,  then  religion  stands 
firmly  grounded  as  a  natural  and  necessary 
part  of  the  normal  human  life.  Toward 
such  a  Being  it  is  natural  and  normal  for 
man  to  turn,  in  reverence,  devotion,  and 
prayer.  Dependence,  obligation,  and  the 
desire  for  fellowship,  all  conspire  in  draw¬ 
ing  the  heart  of  man  toward  this  his  God. 
If  filial  fellowship  with  God  is  that  which 
he  must  have,  in  order  to  fulfil  the  son- 
ship  to  which  he  was  born,  then  plainly 
man  w'as  born  for  religion,  and  religion  is 
an  essential  part  of  his  proper  lot.  He 
may  sometimes  forget  it  and  be  false  to 
it,  for  it  is  sadly  possible  for  him  to  be 
false  to  himself;  but  the  order  of  nature 
will  kindly  avenge  itself  upon  such  forget¬ 
fulness,  and  religion  will  not  be  allowed 
permanently  to  be  omitted  from  the  com¬ 
mon  life  of  man.  Though  he  banish  it, 
it  will  come  back  in  new  forms,  to  grow 
sweeter  and  stronger  as  life  moves  on.  A 
child  is  born  to  grow  up  in  the  family, 


BETWEEN  GOD  AND  MEN  15  I 

and  cannot  properly  grow  up  anywhere 
else. 

As  to  the  character  of  religion,  the  rela¬ 
tion  that  we  have  been  considering  gives 
us  a  helpful  word  of  practical  definition. 
According  to  this  relation,  religion  is  to 
man  a  family  matter.  It  is  not  a  matter 
between  himself  and  an  abstraction,  or  a 
stranger,  or  a  God  to  whom  he  bears  no 
kin;  it  is  a  matter  between  man  and  his 
Father.  It  is  a  family  matter,  a  matter 
in  which  sweet  and  helpful  relations  are 
involved,  a  matter  in  which  a  man  may 
find  himself  acting  out  his  spiritual  nature 
in  simple  and  normal  wise,  living  at  home, 
where  he  belongs,  and  where  his  true 
blessing  dwells. 

It  is  this,  I  suppose,  that  has  made 
religion  to  exist.  Investigators  into  the 
early  history  of  mankind  have  labored  to 
trace  inductively  the  origin  and  growth 
of  religion,  and  show  out  of  what  forms 
of  experience,  external  and  internal,  the 


152 


THE  RELATION 


ideas  and  practice  of  religion  grew  up. 
The  inquiry  is  a  worthy  one,  and  is  at¬ 
tended  by  valuable  results.  The  genesis 
of  religious  feeling  may  to  a  great  extent 
be  traced.  But  it  is  a  mistake  to  imagine 
that  inductions  thus  obtained  can  show 
what  it  was  in  human  nature  that  made 
religion  necessary  to  man,  or  what  it  was 
that  kept  religion  alive  during  the  long 
ages  in  which  it  was  to  mankind  far  more 
a  burden  and  a  dread  than  a  source  of 
comfort.  All  forms  of  religion  have  been 
forms  of  man’s  grasping  after  that  filial 
divine  fellowship  for  which  he  was  born. 
Saint  Augustine’s  great  word  might  stand 
as  key-word  for  the  religious  history  of 
mankind,  —  “  Thou  hast  made  us  for  thy¬ 
self,  and  our  heart  is  restless  till  it  find 
rest  in  thee.”  If  man  had  not  been  God’s 
offspring,  though  he  knew  it  not,  he  would 
not  from  his  earliest  days  have  been  feel¬ 
ing  after  his  Father.  Feeling  after  his 
Father  he  has  always  been,  groping  after 


BETWEEN  GOD  AND  MEN 


153 


that  family  relation  to  which  his  nature 
made  him  heir,  seeking  to  be  at  home  with 
the  powers  above  him,  to  which  he  was 
akin.  And  in  every  nation,  he  that  fear- 
etli  God  and  worketh  righteousness  is 
accepted  of  him. 

But  do  I  quite  mean  what  I  say,  when 
I  call  religion  a  family  matter,  a  matter 
between  child  and  Father?  for  that  would 
imply  that  throughout  the  life  of  religion 
the  Father  was  as  real  as  the  child,  and  as 
present,  and  as  active.  It  ought  to  mean 
that  in  the  activity  of  religion  the  Father 
bears  his  part  as  well  as  the  child,  —  nay, 
more  than  the  child  does,  or  can,  since 
the  Father  is  greater  than  the  child,  and 
wiser,  and  more  capable,  and  more  inter¬ 
ested,  too.  Do  I  mean  all  this?  Yes,  I 
mean  all  this.  I  cannot  answer  all  the 
questions  that  it  involves,  but  I  am  not  at 
liberty  to  believe  anything  less  concerning 
the  relation  between  God  and  men.  In 
this  relation  it  must  certainly  be  true  that 


154 


THE  RELATION’ 


God  is  far  beforehand  with  his  children,  in 
promoting  that  fellowship  in  which  relig¬ 
ion  consists.  He  moves  forth  to  his  off¬ 
spring,  not  meeting  them  half-way,  but 
going  far  more  than  half-way,  and  even 
inciting  them  to  move  forth  toward  him. 
To  Saint  Augustine’s  key- word  for  the 
history  of  religion,  we  may  add  this  from 
a  greater  than  Saint  Augustine:  “God 
is  a  Spirit,  and  they  that  worship  him 
must  worship  him  in  spirit  and  in  truth : 
for  the  Father  seeketh  such  to  worship 
him.”  The  history  of  religion  is  the  his¬ 
tory  of  the  Father’s  long  seeking  for  wor¬ 
shippers  who  shall  worship  him  in  spirit 
and  at  the  same  time  in  accordance  with 
reality.  He  seeks  long  and  patiently  to 
be  worshipped,  himself,  the  real  God  and 
Father,  for  what  he  is,  by  the  real  man 
his  child,  in  the  sincerity  of  his  soul. 

So  from  of  old,  even  in  prehistoric  days, 
when  men  were  groping  after  God,  God 
was  already  reaching  forth  to  men.  As 


BETWEEN  GOD  AND  MEN  1 55 


they  gained  their  bodily  and  mental  powers 
through  the  response  of  life  to  its  environ¬ 
ment,  so  they  gained  the  use  of  their  spirit¬ 
ual  and  religious  powers  through  response 
to  an  environment  that  was  wholly  invisi¬ 
ble,  but  not  less  real  on  that  account,  —  an 
environment  of  their  Father’s  forth-reach¬ 
ing  love  and  care.  All  down  through  the 
ages  of  religion,  there  has  been  something 
that  bore  the  nature  of  revelation,  an  in¬ 
tentional  imparting  of  outward  knowledge 
or  else  of  inward  light,  proceeding  from 
God  himself,  who  willed  that  it  should 
come  to  pass.  This  impartation  from  God 
the  invisible  environment,  became  more 
definite  and  helpful  as  the  possibility  on 
man’s  side  increased.  The  crown  and 
fulness  of  revelation  came  in  the  appear¬ 
ing  among  men  of  Jesus  Christ,  through 
whom  the  Father  of  men  made  his  clearest 
self-expression,  and  wrought  his  lowliest 
work  of  help  for  his  human  offspring. 
Through  him  it  was  made  plain  how  the 


156 


THE  RELATION 


Father,  who  is  in  secret,  feels  toward  his 
children,  and  how  he  seeks  to  help  them 
out  of  their  own  evil  into  their  normal 
sonship.  Consequently,  through  Jesus 
Christ  there  has  been  wrought  the  highest 
and  worthiest  experience  of  sonship,  the 
completing  of  the  filial  relation  through 
faith  and  love  and  purity.  Here  has  grown 
up  an  experience  of  sonship  to  God,  so 
rich  and  full  and  satisfying  that  many 
have  overlooked  all  sonship  besides,  and 
affirmed  that  none  but  this  was  genuine 
in  any  sense  whatever.  Yet  this  spiritual 
sonship  is  only  the  fulfilment  of  God’s 
creative  ideal,  expressed  when  he  created 
man  in  his  own  likeness.  In  Christ  comes 
the  fulfilment  of  the  religious  relation, 
because  in  Christ  has  come  the  fulfilment 
of  the  family  idea  of  God.  To  those  who 
are  in  Christ,  God  is  Father,  in  the  sense 
that  from  the  beginning  he  had  in  mind, 
and  men  are  his  sons  in  the  manner  that 
corresponds  to  their  creation  and  fulfils 


BETWEEN  GOD  AND  MEN  1 57 


their  destiny.  Religion  is,  therefore,  truly 
and  fully  a  family  matter  now.  So  Jesus 
taught  us,  when  he  bade  us  pray,  “  Our 
Father  which  art  in  heaven.”  So  Paul 
had  learned  when  he  said,  “We  have  re¬ 
ceived  the  spirit  of  adoption,  whereby  we 
cry,  Abba,  Father.”  So  John  knew,  when 
he  wrote,  “  Beloved,  now  are  we  the  sons 
of  God.”  The  relation  between  God  and 
men  is  such  that  in  all  highest  and  holiest 
religious  experience  it  is  simply  completed 
in  its  true  meaning.  The  holiest  and  most 
loyal  man  that  shall  ever  walk  the  earth, 
or  love  God  and  do  his  will  in  the  im¬ 
mortal  life  that  is  now  invisible,  will  sim¬ 
ply  be  a  full-grown  son  of  God,  who  has 
experienced  the  full  meaning  and  blessed¬ 
ness  of  the  relation  between  God  and  men. 

I  am  intensely  interested  in  the  fact 
that  I  have  found  this  relation  between 
God  and  men  attested,  as  it  seems  to  me 
that  it  is,  both  by  the  natural  order  of 


i5» 


THE  RELATION 


the  world  and  by  the  Christian  revelation. 
It  is,  indeed,  an  interesting  fact,  and 
useful  in  our  apologetics.  The  modern 
method  of  proof,  we  know,  in  regard  to 
great  realities,  is  by  comparison  rather 
•  than  by  direct  argumentation.  We  do 
not  construct  and  depend  upon  separate 
forms  of  proof,  either  syllogistic  or  ana¬ 
logical,  for  the  existence  of  God,  or  the 
immortality  of  man,  or  the  validity  of  the 
moral  law,  so  much  as  our  forefathers  did. 
We  know  that  we  live  in  a  universe,  and 
we  believe  in  the  unity  of  things.  We 
lay  things  out  before  us,  and  see  how  they 
fit  together;  and  the  convincing  evidence 
in  favor  of  a  view  of  things  is  that  it  does 
fit.  We  carry  along  the  deep  conviction 
that  the  universe  is  one,  that  things  agree, 
and  that  when  we  find  the  right  thing  it 
will  fit  in  with  other  things,  and  that  will 
be  its  vindication.  The  explanation  that 
most  thoroughly  explains  is  the  one  that 
we  accept  as  the  true.  We  must  needs  go 


BETWEEN  GOD  AND  MEN 


159 


carefully  in  this,  for  we  are  liable  to  error, 
and  may  have  errors  to  correct,  and  yet 
we  are  sure  that  the  method  is  trust¬ 
worthy.  On  this  method  it  comes  to  pass 
that  one  thing  supports  another.  Confi¬ 
dence  is  cumulative.  The  universal  order 
confirms  the  separate  parts  that  fit  together 
to  compose  it;  and  the  separate  parts,  fit¬ 
ting  together,  confirm  our  confidence  in 
the  universal  order. 

It  is,  therefore,  both  interesting  and 
satisfactory  to  me  to  find  the  evolution¬ 
ary  view  and  the  Christian  view  of  the 
relation  between  God  and  men  so  far 
bearing  one  testimony.  See  how  they 
hold  together.  The  Spirit  of  the  evolv¬ 
ing  world  is  truly  our  Father;  and  by 
that  name  Jesus  bade  us  call  God.  The 
Spirit  of  the  evolving  world  is  good, 
or  else  we  know  nothing  about  goodness 
and  cannot  trust  our  own  being ;  and  the 
Christian  revelation  declares  God  to  be 
infinitely  good.  The  Spirit  of  the  evolv- 


i6o 


THE  RELATION 


ing  world  must  be  interested  in  us,  as 
spirits  akin  to  his  own  originating  self; 
and  through  Christ  we  have  learned  that 
God  is  love.  The  ideals  of  the  evolving 
Spirit  are  impressed  upon  his  work,  and 
man  is  the  personal  spirit,  most  like  him¬ 
self,  in  whom  the  highest  ideals,  the  moral, 
ought  to  be  realized;  and  under  Christian 
teaching  I  long  since  learned  that  we 
were  created  in  God’s  likeness,  and  had 
it  for  our  normal  destiny  to  grow  up 
into  resemblance  to  his  moral  excellence. 
When  I  find  two  witnesses  agreeing,  and 
so  confirming  each  other’s  testimony,  I 
receive  each  more  confidently  because  of 
the  other.  I  perceive  that  the  unfolding 
world,  informed  and  directed  by  the  pater¬ 
nal  Spirit  whom  I  find  expressed  therein, 
is  a  natural  home  for  such  a  religion  as 
Christianity,  the  religion  of  the  divine 
Father,  and  that  Christianity  is  such  a 
religion  as  it  is  reasonable  to  think  that  I 
may  find  as  the  crown  of  religion  in  such 


BETWEEN  GOD  AND  MEN  l6l 


a  world.  Hence,  believing  in  Christian¬ 
ity,  I  believe  also  in  the  evolutionary  order 
of  the  world;  and  believing  in  the  evolu¬ 
tionary  order  of  the  world,  I  believe  also 
in  Christianity. 


IV 

THE  MORAL  EFFECT  OF  THE 
DOCTRINE  OF  GOD 


IV 


THE  MORAL  EFFECT  OF  THE 
DOCTRINE  OF  GOD 

What  has  been  the  total  effect  of  religion 
upon  morals  in  the  long  lifetime  of  human¬ 
ity,  it  is  impossible  to  discover  and  diffi¬ 
cult  to  guess.  If  we  inquire,  the  field  is 
too  vast  for  us,  and  over  the  larger  part  of 
it  hang  the  prehistoric  mists.  Within  the 
part  that  we  know  something  of,  we  are 
haunted  by  a  fallacy,  from  which  it  seems 
impossible  to  escape.  We  persistently 
carry  back  our  modern  standards  of  eth¬ 
ical  judgment,  and  estimate  the  morals  of 
the  past  by  the  tests  of  the  present. 
“How  low,  how  fearfully  low,”  we  ex¬ 
claim,  “were  the  morals  of  that  past  day! 
We  are  shocked  by  the  horror  of  it.  They 
had  religion,  and  it  was  a  mighty  element 


THE  MORAL  EFFECT 


1 66 

in  their  life,  and  yet  in  morals  they  rose 
no  higher  than  that.  Surely  religion  can¬ 
not  have  elevated  them  much;  perhaps  it 
even  depressed  them.”  Even  in  going 
back  two  or  three  centuries,  and  estimat¬ 
ing  the  effect  of  Christianity  upon  the 
conduct  of  devout  and  conscientious  Chris¬ 
tians,  as  the  Pilgrim  fathers,  we  fall  into 
this  misjudgment.  “Put  yourself  in  his 
place,”  appears  to  be  one  of  the  counsels 
of  perfection,  not  a  rule  for  ordinary  mor¬ 
tals.  Whereas  I  suppose  that  all  we  can 
reasonably  ask  to  find  is,  that  religion,  in 
some  given  period,  historic  or  prehistoric, 
has  enabled  men  better  to  live  in  fidelity 
to  such  moral  standards  as  they  had,  and 
has  helped  progressively  to  raise  their 
standards.  If  this  has  been  done,  religion 
has  been  helpful  to  morals,  even  when 
both  were  low  in  grade. 

If  we  knew  all  the  facts,  I  have  no 
doubt  that  we  should  find  that  religion, 
all  through  human  history,  has  been  on 


OF  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  GOD  1 67 


the  whole  a  real  help  to  morals.  There 
have  doubtless  been  exceptions,  and  relig¬ 
ion  has  sometimes  led  men  to  violate  their 
best  moral  convictions.  But  these  have 
not  been  commonest,  I  judge,  in  those 
lower  grades  where  we  would  first  suspect 
them,  hut  on  higher  levels,  where  ethical 
training  has  sometimes  been  better  than 
religious,  and  the  standards  of  the  two 
have  come  to  differ.  Yet  this  has  not 
been  the  ordinary  thing  in  history.  On 
the  whole,  religion  has  reinforced  and 
elevated  the  moral  sense.  It  has  added 
sanctions  of  its  own  to  support  the  claim 
of  duty,  and  offered  motives  that  were 
helpful  to  good  living.  Throughout  the 
human  period  morality  has  been  purer 
and  more  progressive  by  reason  of  its  in¬ 
fluence.  I  do  not  suppose  that  I  can 
demonstrate  this,  nor  do  I  suppose  that 
demonstration  is  called  for.  The  helpful¬ 
ness  of  religion  to  morals  is  not  generally 
doubted. 


1 68  THE  MORAL  EFFECT 

The  principle  of  the  usefulness  of  reli¬ 
gion  to  ethics  is  plain  enough.  Let  me 
speak  of  the  human  aspect  of  it,  before  I 
come  to  the  divine.  Religion  brings  in 
influences  and  motives  from  the  invisible 
world,  to  affect  the  conduct  of  men  here 
and  now ;  and  in  the  invisible  world, 
where  gods  are  located,  the  worthiest 
human  ideals  are  enthroned.  The  best 
that  men  have  known  they  have  placed 
yonder,  in  the  divine ;  and  back  upon 
them  have  flowed  the  wholesome  effects 
of  their  own  best  conceptions. 

Only  see  how  powerful  a  combination 
this  is.  The  very  fact  of  an  acknowledged 
connection  of  present  life  with  a  world 
invisible  —  which  world  invisible  can  be 
nothing  but  a  world  spiritual  —  is  by  itself 
a  great  thing  for  man.  There  are  dangers 
in  such  a  thought,  I  know,  —  dangers  of 
ignorance,  of  error,  and  of  fraud;  dangers 
so  great  that  some  have  thought  it  would 
have  been  as  well  if  men  had  never  thought 


OF  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  GOD  169 


of  relation  with  a  world  unseen.  But  what 
would  that  have  meant?  Thank  God  it 
has  not  been  possible,  for  it  would  have 
meant  that  humanity  was  of  this  earth 
alone,  and  had  no  valid  ties  or  inter¬ 
ests  or  obligations  above  it.  .  As  it  is, 
religion  has  imported  to  the  present  life 
motives  and  sanctions  from  above,  and 
has  brought  to  human  existence  a  large¬ 
ness,  a  dignity,  a  solemnity,  not  other¬ 
wise  possible.  No  one  can  estimate  the 
contribution  that  religion  has  thus  made 
to  the  significance  and  the  worthiness  of 
human  conduct.  Now  add  to  this  the 
other  fact,  that  in  that  world  invisible 
the  best  that  men  have  thought  is  located 
by  their  imagination.  In  some  form  or 
other,  the  human  ideals  are  there  set  up 
for  admiration  and  for  worship.  Only  in 
a  rough  and  approximate  way  may  this 
sometimes  appear  to  us  to  be  true,  and 
with  that  strange  perverseness  of  which  I 
spoke  at  first,  we  may  refuse  to  conceive 


170 


THE  MORAL  EFFECT 


that  such  ideas  as  we  find  apotheosized 
were  ever  ideals  to  any  one.  Neverthe¬ 
less,  the  fact  is  unaffected  by  our  lack  of 
imagination  and  our  unsympathetic  supe¬ 
riority.  Men  did  think  of  their  gods  in 
terms  of  their  best  ideas.  The  qualities 
that  they  most  admired  they  beheld  in 
their  deities ;  and  back  from  enthronement 
in  the  world  of  gods  came  these  ideals  of 
men,  to  exert  a  helpful  influence,  such  as 
it  was,  in  the  realm  of  daily  conduct. 
Thus  the  best  that  was  human  obtained  a 
sanction  from  the  divine.  Slight  and  slow 
the  uplift  may  have  been,  but  who  does 
not  see  that  here  we  have  a  means  of 
uplifting  for  the  ethical  life? 

Is  religion,  then,  just  a  human  inven¬ 
tion?  No,  it  is  a  divine  gift  also.  I  do 
not  believe  that  its  helpfulness  to  morals 
is  solely  the  fruit  of  man’s  apotheosizing 
of  his  own  ideals.  I  believe,  as  I  have 
said  already,  that  the  long  history  of 
religion  has  not  gone  on  unnoticed  or 


OF  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  GOD  iyi 


untouched  by  the  living  God.  He,  from 
whose  conceiving  mind  the  human  race 
came  forth,  has  always  had  relations  with 
that  race  in  respect  of  religion.  While 
man  was  deifying  his  own  best  concep¬ 
tions,  God  was  aware  of  it,  and,  in  ways 
that  I  am  unable  to  describe  or  explain, 
was  doing  his  helpful  part  for  religion. 

This  statement  raises  questions  enough, 
but  it  is  true.  Men  have  believed  in  ten 
thousand  gods,  but  there  has  been  only 
one  God  meanwhile,  and  he  has  always 
been  interested  in  his  creatures.  None  of 
us  know  him  very  well,  even  now;  our 
thoughts  of  him  are  crude  and  poor;  and 
yet  we  believe  that  he  is  interested  in  our 
religion.  Where,  then,  shall  we  draw  the 
line  in  the  past,  and  say  that  beyond  it 
our  brothers,  bearing  his  likeness  too,  were 
so  ignorant  and  crude  that  in  their  religion 
he  could  take  no  interest?  We  may  be 
sure  that  he  has  watched  the  long  move¬ 
ment  of  religion,  and  has  helped  the  spirit 


172 


THE  MORAL  EFFECT 


of  man  to  rise  above  this  world,  even 
when  it  could  rise  but  a  little  way.  When 
once  we  have  banished  the  groundless  idea 
that  every  touch  of  God  must  immediately 
produce  what  is  perfect,  we  shall  have  no 
difficulty  in  believing  this.  And  if  we 
really  and  vitally  believe  in  God  as  the 
creative  source  of  all  spirits  that  have 
ever  lived,  we  shall  have  infinite  difficulty 
in  believing  anything  different. 

In  the  course  of  time  God,  seeking  his 
children,  was  able  to  make  himself  known 
to  them  more  clearly  and  adequately.  His 
manifestation  of  himself  is  called  by  Chris¬ 
tians  revelation.  We  are  familiar  with 
the  record  of  it  in  the  history  of  the 
Hebrew  people.  In  seeking  to  understand 
revelation,  we  may  not  be  able  to  answer 
all  our  own  questions,  or  to  agree  in  tell¬ 
ing  just  how  the  Eternal  Reality,  God, 
bore  in  upon  the  hearts  of  men  the  sense 
of  what  he  was;  but  certainly  this  is 
exactly  what  he  did.  It  was  not  merely 


OF  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  GOD  1 73 


that  men  thought  him  out,  and  rose, 
through  experience,  to  worthier  views  of 
his  character.  This  they  did,  and  some 
would  have  us  believe  that  this  was  all 
there  was  of  it.  But  they  were  not  alone 
in  the  doing  of  this,  for  he  was  there  all 
the  time,  and  was  presenting  himself  to 
them,  while  they  were  seeking  him.  Does 
an}^  one  doubt  it?  God  was  not  passive 
while  his  children  were  active  in  thinking 
him  out;  he  was  active  as  well  as  they, 
and  the  knowledge  that  they  gained  of 
him  was  his  gift  as  well  as  their  attain¬ 
ment,  and  may  fitly  be  called  a  result  of 
revelation,  or  of  God’s  unveiling  of  him¬ 
self  to  men.  But  let  us  not  fail  to  under¬ 
stand  that  on  his  side  this  was  no  unique 
or  solitary  act.  In  what  we  generally 
agree  to  call  revelation,  within  the  period 
of  Hebrew  history,  God  was  simply  advanc¬ 
ing  further,  as  the  time  and  conditions  now 
allowed,  in  that  long  movement  of  pater¬ 
nal  interest  in  his  creatures,  of  which  the 


174 


THE  MORAL  EFFECT 


unrecorded  ages  of  the  world  had  already 
contained  manifold  evidence.  What  was 
said  by  Paul  to  the  Lycaonians  might  just 
as  well  have  been  said  to  the  lake-dwellers : 
“The  living  God,  who  made  the  heaven 
and  the  earth  and  the  sea,  and  all  that  in 
them  is,  suffered  all  the  nations  to  walk  in 
their  own  ways,  and  yet  left  not  himself 
without  witness,  in  that  he  did  good,  and 
gave  you  rains  from  heaven,  and  fruitful 
seasons,  filling  your  hearts  with  food  and 
gladness.”  And  when  Paul  said,  “It 
pleased  God  to  reveal  his  Son  in  me,” 
he  was  speaking  of  a  later  and  greater 
step  in  the  same  great  progress  of  self¬ 
manifestation.  Thus  the  divine  part  has 
always  been  as  real  in  religion  as  the 
human. 

As  for  the  effect  of  God’s  self-revelation 
upon  morals,  this  began  to  attain  its  effec¬ 
tive  and  worthy  power  when  God  was 
manifest  as  One,  and  as  Good.  The  best 


OF  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  GOD  1 75 


possible  form  of  religion  is,  of  course,  the 
religion  that  recognizes  one  good  God,  and 
recognizes  him  worthily,  in  worship  and 
in  conduct.  Where  such  discernment  is 
present,  however  dim,  the  effect  in  ethics 
must  be  good.  In  the  days  of  the  Old 
Testament  this  came  to  pass  more  fully 
than  before,  and  the  moral  effect  appeared. 
The  moral  effect  was  this :  men  were  told 
that  if  they  desired  friendly  relations  with 
God,  they  must  break  off  their  sins. 

So  said  the  prophets.  God  is  holy,  God 
is  pure,  God  is  righteous,  but  men  are 
sinful.  If  you  desire  to  have  him  for 
your  God,  you  must  break  off  your  sins, 
and  live  in  holiness  and  righteousness 
before  him.  Thus  the  prophets  thun¬ 
dered.  The  same  teaching  was  expressed 
in  symbolic  form  in  the  Levitical  institu¬ 
tions,  so  that  prophets  and  law-givers  alike 
proclaimed  the  one  duty  of  men,  to  put 
away  their  evil  if  they  desired  friendly 
dealings  with  their  God,  since  God  was 


176 


THE  MORAL  EFFECT 


holy.  Thus  did  religion  assert  itself,  and 
announce  its  claim  in  the  field  of  ethics, 
as  soon  as  it  was  perceived  that  God  is 
One,  and  God  is  good. 

Men  were  told  that  they  must  put  away 
their  sins.  We  do  not  need  just  here  to  dis¬ 
cuss  the  nature  of  sin,  or  the  theory  of  its 
connections  in  the  universe,  interesting 
though  it  would  be  to  do  so.  But  we  have 
to  do  with  it  here,  because  it  is  so  tremen¬ 
dous  an  element  in  the  relation  between 
God  and  men.  When  we  study  sociological 
ethics,  we  meet  with  crime,  and  vice ;  but 
when  we  come  to  the  deepest  ethics,  the 
ethics  of  the  soul  in  its  relation  to  God, 
we  encounter  sin.  God  encounters  sin 
when  he  seeks  to  fulfil  the  destiny  of  his 
children.  It  is  the  thing  that  resists  him, 
not  merely  in  the  manner  of  inertia,  but 
more  in  the  manner  of  wilfulness.  It 
includes  vice  and  crime,  and  much  that 
is  neither.  It  is  the  choice  and  habit,  the 
will  and  character,  by  which  the  ideal  of 


OF  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  GOD  1 77 


the  conceiving  Spirit  is  rejected,  and  his 
purpose  is  resisted.  In  this  definition  I 
have  intentionally  spoken  of  it  not  in 
terms  of  religion  or  revelation,  but  in 
terms  of  the  organized  and  meaningful 
world.  It  is  often  assumed  that  the  evo¬ 
lutionary  view  of  the  world  has  no  place 
for  sin,  which  indeed  is  a  thing  uncounted 
upon  outside  the  realm  of  religion.  But 
only  suppose  a  conceiving  Spirit,  in  whom 
the  moral  ideals  of  personal  existence  are 
present  and  to  whom  they  are  dear,  and 
the  thing  that  we  call  sin  can  be  under¬ 
stood.  Suppose  that  in  seeking  to  bring 
his  spiritual  offspring  along  the  road  of 
life  to  their  appropriate  destiny  in  fellow¬ 
ship  with  himself,  he  finds  himself  resisted 
by  them.  The  blameworthiness  of  their 
resistance  varies,  and  he  always  judges  it 
righteously,  but  it  exists ;  there  is  real 
responsibility  and  real  blame  in  them. 
They  cling  to  what  was  blameless  or  even 
normal  once,  in  lower  stages,  and  insist 


12 


i;8 


THE  MORAL  EFFECT 


upon  keeping  it  on  beyond  its  day,  to  cor¬ 
rupt  and  spoil  a  higher  state  of  being. 
They  love  what  is  inferior,  and  cleave  to 
what  is  unworthy  of  them,  and  will  have 
none  of  that  higher  life  which  is  dear  to 
him  who  created  them  for  himself.  This 
blameworthy  resistance  to  the  upward 
movement  which  is  dear  to  the  creative 
Spirit,  is  just  as  intelligible  in  an  unfold¬ 
ing  world  as  it  is  in  the  realm  of  religion. 
To  the  Mind  that  conceived  the  universe, 
as  well  as  to  the  God  of  Christianity,  the 
thing  that  is  spoiling  his  offspring  must  be 
hateful.  And  so  sin  is  a  reality  in  the 
world,  and  its  hostility  to  the  ruling  end 
and  purpose  of  existence  is  the  point  of 
evil  in  it,  whether  God  be  thought  of  as 
the  God  of  evolution  or  as  the  God  of 
salvation. 

In  the  presence  of  sin,  the  God  of  evo¬ 
lution  and  the  God  of  salvation  are  one. 
The  one  thing  clear  and  certain  is,  that 
God  must  be  against  sin,  in  his  attitude 


OF  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  GOD  1 79 


of  mind  and  in  the  administration  of  the 
world.  He  is  against  it  because  it  is 
against  him.  It  opposes  him  in  the  fulfil¬ 
ment  of  his  creative  purpose,  and  therefore 
he  opposes  it.  Hence  we  are  not  surprised 
to  hear  the  voice  going  forth  with  tremen¬ 
dous  energy,  telling  men  that  if  they  are 
to  have  to  do  with  God  they  must  put 
away  their  sins.  This  is  the  voice  of 
moral  nature  and  necessity,  and  it  cannot 
be  silent.  It  is  the  voice  of  righteousness 
and  of  love.  It  is  the  voice  of  a  Saviour. 

Notice  now  the  form  in  which  for  a  long 
time  this  appeal  of  God  to  men  was  made, 
—  or,  in  other  words,  the  mode  of  entrance 
of  the  doctrine  of  God  to  the  field  of 
ethics.  The  appeal  was  long  made  prin¬ 
cipally  in  the  form  of  command. 

This  was  naturally  the  first  form;  the 
divine  sends  its  requirements  down  to  the 
human.  The  will  of  God  must  be  obeyed, 
and  it  is  made  known  in  commandments. 


i8o 


THE  MORAL  EFFECT 


mediated  usually  through  messengers. 
This  was  the  instinctive  first  thought 
when  men  began  to  think  of  dealings  be¬ 
tween  themselves  and  higher  powers,  and 
this  was  the  thought  and  feeling  of  the 
religious  Hebrew  spirit.  The  kingly  idea 
was  dominant,  in  association  with  the  idea 
of  transcendence.  God  was  above  all. 
From  the  heavens  he  looked  down  upon 
the  earth.  It  was  as  a  king  that  he  sat 
above,  “a  great  king,  above  all  gods.”  It 
is  true  that  he  visited  the  earth,  as  when 
he  came  down  in  power  and  glory  at  Mount 
Sinai.  It  is  true  also  that  his  voice  was 
heard  on  earth,  in  the  thunder,  and  that 
men  said,  “  The  whole  earth  is  full  of  Thy 
riches:  the  Lord  of  hosts  is  with  us,  the 
God  of  Jacob  is  our  refuge.”  Neverthe¬ 
less,  God  was  predominantly  the  king, 
ruling  above,  uttering  law,  claiming  obe¬ 
dience,  and  sending  to  the  world  by  the 
hand  of  messengers  the  spoken  will  of  a 
sovereign. 


OF  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  GOD  1 8  I 


When  I  say  that  for  long  the  best  reli¬ 
gion  in  the  world  was  cast  in  this  mould 
of  sovereignty  and  commandment,  I  mean 
more  than  that  men  guessed  at  the  truth 
thus.  I  mean  that  God  was  willing  to  be 
known  thus.  God  was  moving  toward 
men,  as  well  as  men  toward  God,  to  the 
end  that  they  might  know  him  better.  But 
his  approach  to  men  must  be  made  in 
forms  that  they  could  profit  by.  The  kingly 
conception  of  God  was  partial,  but  was 
not  untrue.  It  represented  a  great  truth, 
and  represented  it  effectively,  —  the  truth 
of  his  greatness  and  his  rightful  supremacy. 
It  was  right,  therefore,  as  well  as  natural, 
that  religion  should  for  the  time  be  cast  in 
the  mould  of  royalty,  and  the  idea  of  sov¬ 
ereign  authority  should  be  at  the  front. 
With  the  idea  of  sovereign  authority  went 
the  idea  of  commands  as  from  a  king,  and 
the  idea  of  obedience,  such  as  loj^al  men 
give  to  their  rightful  rulers.  Thus  came 
together  this  group  of  kindred  ideas :  God 


1 82 


THE  MORAL  EFFECT 


sits  as  king  over  the  world;  God  rules 
by  law;  God  brings  or  sends  his  messages 
of  law  to  men;  men  learn  their  duty 
through  God’s  commanding  them;  men 
must  obey  God’s  commands. 

Thus,  by  the  way  of  law  and  command¬ 
ment,  religion  entered  the  field  of  ethics, 
and  the  conception  of  God  became  effec¬ 
tive  in  morals.  A  natural  result  was 
that  the  commands  were  largely  prohibi¬ 
tions.  This  is  the  way  of  governments. 
To  this  day,  on  the  statute  books  of 
states,  law  touches  ordinary  conduct 
mainly  by  way  of  prohibition,  or  else  of 
limitation  and  restraint,  which  is  partial 
prohibition.  God’s  voice  was  oftenest 
heard  saying,  “Thou  shalt  not.”  Posi¬ 
tive  requirements  were  added,  and  the 
constructive  element  was  not  absent  from 
this  scheme  of  command  for  human  duty, 
and  yet  the  tone  of  the  whole  system  in¬ 
clined  to  the  cautionary  and  prohibitive, 
and  in  the  great  system  of  commands  the 


OF  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  GOD  183 


course  of  action  was  guarded  more  than  it 
was  inspired,  protected  from  evil  more 
than  it  was  filled  with  good. 

When  religion  struck  into  ethics  through 
commands  from  the  divine  king,  the  effect 
could  not  fail  to  be  very  great.  This  ap¬ 
peal  is  very  powerful,  —  God  is  worthy, 
God  is  sovereign,  God  commands.  Its 
influence  reaches  far  through  the  ages,  as 
it  has  a  right  to  do.  The  system  of  com¬ 
mands  has  the  great  practical  advantage 
of  being  compact,  convenient,  and  intel¬ 
ligible,  and  the  graces  of  reverence,  hu¬ 
mility,  and  obedience  are  fostered  by  it. 

I  have  not  time  to  speak  of  the  abuse  of 
the  method,  and  the  injury  to  ethics  and 
religion  at  once,  that  came  in  through 
the  mis  judgments  of  Pharisaism.  In¬ 
stead,  I  must  follow  the  method  of 
sovereignty  and  commandment  into  Chris¬ 
tianity,  and  trace  its  influence  upon  ethics 
in  the  world  with  which  we  are  all 
familiar 


184 


THE  MORAL  EFFECT 


I  need  not  remind  my  auditors  that  in 
the  history  of  Christianity  itself  the  regal 
idea  of  God  has  been  extremely  influential. 
In  the  first  place,  it  is  matter  of  record  that 
Christianity  itself  very  early  came  to  be 
regarded  by  many  of  its  adherents  as  essen¬ 
tially  a  law,  like  that  of  the  Old  Testa¬ 
ment,  —  a  law  that  differed  from  the  older 
one  mainly  in  that  it  was  more  spiritual  in 
its  requirements,  and  was  accompanied  by 
power  to  get  itself  obeyed.  But  in  an¬ 
other  way  the  kingly  idea  of  God  has 
found  large  expression  and  exerted  long 
influence,  namely,  through  schemes  of 
doctrine  that  have  sovereignty  for  their 
centre. 

Only  see  how  abundant  was  the  ma¬ 
terial,  in  Christian  times,  for  the  forma¬ 
tion  of  such  a  system.  Here  was  the 
Hebrew  idea,  rendered  permanent  by  the 
sacredness  of  the  Hebrew  scriptures,  of 
God  as  reigning  in  glorious  sovereignty 
over  all.  Here  was  the  current  philo- 


OF  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  GOD  1 85 


sophical  idea  of  God  as  transcendent,  not 
inhabiting  the  world,  but  separate  from  it 
and  governing  it  from  without.  Here  was 
the  Christian  idea  of  God  as  infinitely 
good,  and  as  entertaining  from  eternity  the 
thoughts  of  saving  grace  toward  sinful 
humanity.  And  here  is  the  constructional 
idea,  if  I  may  call  it  so,  that  a  perfect 
king  cannot  reign  without  perfect  system, 
in  which  everything  is  planned  and  de¬ 
creed  beforehand,  and  comes  to  pass  in 
complete  accordance  with  the  original  in¬ 
tention.  Ideas  so  harmonious  as  these  do 
certainly  seem  foreordained  to  come  to¬ 
gether,  bone  to  his  bone,  and  form  a  great 
theory  of  divine  operation,  in  which  all 
things  shall  stand  forth  consistent,  straight¬ 
forward,  exceptionless.  According  to  the 
scheme  that  is  thus  suggested,  God  is  so 
far  above  that  men  cannot  hope  to  under¬ 
stand  him.  God  is  absolute  sovereign, 
giving  account  of  none  of  his  matters,  and 
under  obligation  to  none  of  his  creatures. 


1 86  THE  MORAL  EFFECT 

As  he  must  in  his  perfection,  he  does  all 
things  according  to  unalterable  decrees, 
held  fast  by  him  from  all  eternity.  Ac¬ 
cording  to  these  decrees  all  things  occur. 
God’s  sovereign  purpose  of  undeserved 
saving  grace  to  sinful  men  is  the  crown¬ 
ing  purpose  of  them  all,  and  the  execu¬ 
tion  of  it  conforms  perfectly  in  extent  and 
method  to  the  foreordained  form  of  it  in  his 
mind.  Men  have  freedom  of  action  only 
within  narrow  limits,  if  indeed  they  have 
it  at  all,  and  there  is  only  one  thoroughly 
effective  will  in  the  universe,  the  will  of 
God.  And  God  is  altogether  good,  his 
will  is  right  and  worthy,  and  whether  his 
work  is  understood  or  not,  he  is  to  be 
absolutely  trusted  as  one  that  has  reasons 
sufficient  for  all  that  he  brings  to  pass  and 
all  that  he  requires  of  men.  This  doc¬ 
trine,  for  substance,  is  Augustinianism ; 
this  doctrine,  in  its  later  and  riper  form,  is 
Calvinism.  Straightforward  logic  is  its 
servitor,  and  its  premises  contain  the  po- 


OF  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  GOD  1 87 


tency  and  promise  of  its  conclusions.  So 
strong  a  system  could  not  fail  of  wide  and 
powerful  influence  in  the  world. 

I  do  not  present  Calvinism  in  order  to 
attack  it  or  defend  it,  but  only  because  it 
offers  one  of  the  greatest  illustrations  of 
the  moral  effect  of  the  doctrine  of  God. 
Calvinism,  or  the  consistent  regal  doctrine 
of  God,  obtained  the  firm  and  unswerving 
loyalty  of  a  multitude  of  the  best  men  and 
women.  It  was  not  mere  assent,  it  was 
loyalty.  Honest,  conscientious,  devoted 
souls  in  great  numbers  accepted  this  view 
of  God,  and  took  it  into  heart  and  life. 
With  them  it  was  no  matter  of  cool  opin¬ 
ion  ;  it  was  absolute,  eternal  truth.  Their 
own  experience  confirmed  it,  too ;  for  they 
had  passed  through  an  agony  concerning 
the  destiny  of  their  souls,  and  had  found 
peace  to  themselves  only  when  they  took 
God’s  sovereignty  for  true,  and  bowed  in 
absolute  submission  and  self -surrender  be¬ 
fore  him  who  could  justly  dispose  of  them 


1 88 


THE  MORAL  EFFECT 


exactly  as  he  pleased.  Who  does  not  see 
the  tremendous  ethical  power  of  such  a 
system  ?  The  ethics  of  Calvinism  was  very 
simple.  God  must  be  absolutely  obeyed. 
In  the  thoughts  of  the  heart  and  the  deeds 
of  the  life,  God  must  be  honored,  adored, 
obeyed  with  absolute  submission.  No 
creature  has  a  moment’s  right  to  think  his 
own  thoughts  against  the  thoughts  of  God, 
or  do  his  own  will  against  the  will  of  God. 
His  commands  are  final,  and  man’s  great 
duty  is  intelligently  to  know  his  will  and 
unquestioningly  to  do  it.  Study,  O  man, 
to  know  what  God  would  have  thee  do, 
and  then  put  the  whole  force  of  thy  being 
into  the  loyal  doing  or  enduring  of  his 
righteous  pleasure.  He  cannot  do  wrong, 
and  thou  canst  not  do  right,  save  in  bow¬ 
ing  to  his  sovereignty. 

A  noble  type  of  character  thus  comes 
.  into  existence.  All  purity  here  finds  en¬ 
couragement.  Firmness,  resoluteness,  self- 
abnegation,  surrender,  are  here  glorified. 


OF  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  GOD  189 


Intelligence  is  not  repressed.  The  entire 
personal  force  of  the  soul  is  wakened  up, 
to  fight  if  need  be,  but  with  or  without  a 
struggle  to  give  itself  away  to  God.  Some 
graces  of  character  would  not  seem  at  home 
here;  yet  it  would  be  vain  to  deny  that 
sooner  or  later  all  the  Christian  graces 
have  grown  and  thriven,  more  or  less 

freely,  under  this  influence.  In  Calvin- 

» 

ism  God  lays  his  heavy  hand  upon  the 
judgment,  the  conscience,  and  the  affec¬ 
tions  of  men,  and  claims  them  for  himself, 
and  man  as  a  moral  being  walks  as  a  cap¬ 
tive  in  God’s  splendid  triumph,  — cower¬ 
ing  sometimes,  but  often  with  head  erect 
and  heart  exultant.  Simply  because  he 
has  bowed  to  God  and  owned  himself  a 
captive,  he  can  hold  his  head  erect,  and 
be  thankful  that  he  is  strong  to  serve  his 
Master.  To  him  it  is  right  that  he  should 
be  saved,  since  this  is  the  eternal  will  of 
God;  and  he  can  most  freely  and  gladly 
use  all  his  powers  in  grateful  consecration 


190 


THE  MORAL  EFFECT 


to  the  God  who  has  loved  him  with  an 
everlasting  love.  Here  is  the  glorification 
of  the  kingly.  And  yet  Calvinism,  per¬ 
haps,  has  broken  as  many  hearts  as  it  has 
nerved. 

Fresh  truths  from  God  do  not  wait,  for 
their  coming  into  the  world,  until  men 
know  themselves  ready  to  receive  them. 
If  they  did,  they  would  never  come.  God 
sends  his  fresh  truth,  and  then  it  has  to 
make  its  way.  Old  truth,  less  advanced 
and  perfect,  is  already  in  the  field,  well 
known  and  well  established,  and  the  new 
may  be  long  in  finding  welcome.  It  will 
be  considered  dangerous  at  first,  because 
it  proposes  methods  and  appeals  that  the 
old  has  not  used,  and  men  will  long  regard 
with  suspicion  and  dread  that  higher  truth 
by  which  God  is  seeking  to  do  better  for 
them  than  he  has  ever  done  before.  Such 
is  the  way  of  humanity.  God  in  his  kind¬ 
ness  does  not  wait  till  men  know  them- 


ft 


OF  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  GOD  191 

selves  in  need  of  a  higher  gift.  He 
sends  the  truth  out  among  them,  to 
win  its  slow  welcome  by  proving  itself 
divine. 

In  the  part  of  mankind  to  which  he 
came,  Jesus  Christ  found  the  regal  idea 
of  God  dominant.  God,  it  was  thought, 
was  above  the  world ;  with  the  great  mass 
of  men  he  communicated  by  sending  mes¬ 
sages  through  others ;  and  human  duty  was 
made  known  mainly  through  command¬ 
ments  which  had  the  force  of  law,  and  in 
obedience  to  which  men  might  find  eternal 
life.  I  know  that  these  statements  need 
some  qualification,  for  in  the  religion  of  the 
Old  Testament  God  was  recognized  as  pres¬ 
ent  in  nature  and  the  events  of  life,  and 
some  men  knew  the  experience  of  deep 
spiritual  fellowship  with  him.  Yet  the  gen¬ 
eral  statement  is  true,  that  when  Jesus  ap¬ 
peared,  the  frame  and  structure  of  religion 
was  built  on  the  foundation  of  regalism 
and  legalism,  rather  than  upon  any  other. 


192 


THE  MORAL  EFFECT 


Jesus  Christ  found  the  regal  idea  of  God 
dominant,  and  brought,  as  God’s  better 
gift,  the  paternal  idea.  It  was  not  un¬ 
known  before,  but  he  introduced  it,  in  the 
sense  that  he  gave  the  living  illustration 
of  what  it  meant,  and  laid  it,  in  God’s 
name,  as  the  true  foundation  for  the  frame 
and  structure  of  religion.  From  his  time 
on,  the  religion  that  struck  in  with  the 
keynote  of  his  influence  made  less  of  the 
kingly,  and  more  of  the  fatherly,  in  God. 
This  is  Christ’s  doctrine.  All  turning 
“back  to  Christ”  means  return  to  the 
glorious  beginnings  of  the  doctrine  of  di¬ 
vine  paternity.  In  our  time  the  fatherly 
element  is  put  forward  in  Christian  teach¬ 
ing  more  than  ever,  and  is  winning  its 
way  through  Christian  thought  and  life  as 
a  formative  idea.  Its  movement  shows  no 
signs  of  reversal  or  retreat. 

What  is  the  proper  ethical  effect  of  this 
paternal  view  of  God?  What  is  to  be  ex- 


OF  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  GOD  1 93 


pected  from  it  in  the  field  of  morals?  It 
has  shared  the  fate  of  higher  gifts  in  gen¬ 
eral,  for  it  has  been  welcomed  as  the  surest 
means  of  bringing  the  days  of  heaven 
upon  the  earth,  and  at  the  same  time 
viewed  with  suspicion,  and  condemned  as 
a  doctrine  of  indifferentism,  fatal  to  all 
high  ethics.  The  hope  and  the  fear,  the 
welcome  and  the  rejection,  are  both  quite 
intelligible,  but  both  cannot  be  justified  by 
the  real  nature  of  the  doctrine,  and  both 
cannot  last.  What  is  the  state  of  the  case  ? 
Which  ought  to  survive?  What  is  the 
normal  effect  in  the  field  of  ethics  of  that 
doctrine  of  fatherhood  and  sonship  which 
has  been  maintained  in  these  lectures,  — 
the  doctrine  that  all  men  are  created  sons 
of  God  by  being  created  by  him  in  his  own 
likeness,  that  God’s  relation  and  feeling 
toward  men  are  essentially  paternal,  but 
that  men  need  to  become  full  sons  to  God 
by  loyally  acknowledging  him  as  Father, 
and  becoming  transformed  into  the  like- 


13 


194 


THE  MORAL  EFFECT 


ness  of  his  character?  What  is  such  a 
doctrine  of  God  as  this  adapted  to  do  for 
morals  ? 

I  would  open  the  answer  to  this  question 
by  noting  that  the  fatherly  relation  does 
not  by  any  means  exclude  the  idea  of 
authority,  or  dispense  with  the  service  of 
commands,  which  are  so  convenient  and 
efficacious  for  the  purposes  of  moral  influ¬ 
ence.  Has  not  a  father  authority  ?  In  fact, 
a  father  is  the  very  one  who  does  possess 
authority,  and  possess  it  by  the  very  na¬ 
ture  of  the  case,  without  the  need  of  any 
arbitrary  arrangement  to  invest  him  with 
it.  A  father’s  authority  is  natural  and 
ungiven,  while  a  king’s  is  not.  God  as 
our  Father  has  a  far  more  intimate  and 
penetrating  authority  upon  us  than  God 
regarded  as  our  king.  And  a  father’s 
authority  may  surely  find  expression  in 
commands,  that  represent  his  will  for  the 
children  whom  he  loves.  No  true  paternal 


OF  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  GOD  1 95 


doctrine  of  God  weakens  his  authority,  or 
stills  the  voice  of  his  commanding.  Nor, 
on  the  other  side,  does  the  fatherly  rela¬ 
tion  provide  any  less  room  for  obedience 
on  the  children’s  part.  Obedience  is  the 
natural  correlative  to  authority,  and  is 
most  natural  where  authority  is  most  nat¬ 
ural.  The  normal  field  for  obedience  is 
first  the  family,  and  obedience  to  God  our 
Father  takes  precedence,  in  the  order  of 
nature,  of  obedience  to  God  our  king. 
When  the  fatherly  relation  is  rightly 
understood,  authority  and  obedience,  so 
far  from  being  discredited,  have  now  for 
the  first  time  come  to  their  own  place  and 
found  their  permanent  standing. 

The  kingly  conception  of  God  has  been 
accompanied  by  a  vivid  sense  of  his  oppo¬ 
sition  to  sin.  Does  the  fatherly  concep¬ 
tion  imply  less  opposition  to  sin  on  his 
part  ?  A  thousand  times,  no.  It  is  often 
supposed  that  the  regal  or  judicial  relation 
of  God  to  men  implies  strict  and  faithful 


196 


THE  MORAL  EFFECT 


hatred  of  men’s  evil,  while  the  parental 
relation  stands  for  softness,  indulgence, 
and  comparative  moral  indifference.  But 
nothing  could  be  more  untrue.  Who  feels 
the  criminal’s  sin  and  shame  more  keenly, 
—  the  judge  who  passes  sentence  on  him,  or 
the  parents  who  gave  him  life  ?  In  human 
affairs  the  judicial  relation  to  sin  or  crime 
is  more  visible,  external,  formal,  dramatic, 
but  the  parental  relation  to  the  sinner  or 
criminal  is  natural,  vital,  heart-constrain¬ 
ing,  and  so,  when  parents  are  good,  the 
parental  hatred  and  grief  at  the  sinner’s 
sin  is  terrible,  heart-breaking,  intolerable. 
The  regal  conception  of  God  affords  more 
vivid  pictorial  views  of  condemnation,  just 
because  it  does  not  go  so  deep  into  the 
heart;  but  it  does  not  compare  with  the 
paternal  conception  in  power  to  set  forth 
God’s  essential,  unalterable,  inexpressible 
hatred  of  sin  in  human  beings.  Can  any 
one  doubt  it  when  the  fact  is  so  simple 
and  so  natural?  God  hates  human  sin, 


OF  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  GOD  1 97 


because  it  is  evil  in  itself,  but  he  hates  it 
also  because  it  is  spoiling  his  children.  It 
is  breaking  up  his  family.  It  is  the  one 
thing  that  abidingly  resists  his  desire  to 
possess  the  filial  love  of  his  own,  and  to 
bring  his  children  up  to  their  destiny. 
Therefore  he  desires  to  deliver  his  chil¬ 
dren  from  it,  and  acts  upon  this  desire. 
Accordingly,  the  paternal  relation  sur¬ 
passes  all  others  in  the  joy  and  satisfaction 
over  the  attainment  of  goodness  that  it 
affords.  The  delight  of  good  parents  in 
their  children’s  goodness  is  such  delight 
as  is  possible  nowhere  else.  If  you  wish 
intelligently  to  conceive  of  God  as  rejoic¬ 
ing  over  the  goodness  of  men  who  have 
become  good,  you  must  think  of  him  as 
their  Father,  loving  them  as  his  own,  and 
now  glorying  in  the  possession  of  his  own 
offspring  in  spiritual  fellowship.  In  the 
parables  of  the  Master,  there  was  gladness 
when  the  woman  found  her  lost  money, 
and  when  the  shepherd  found  his  stray 


198 


THE  MORAL  EFFECT 


sheep,  but  there  was  deeper  joy  when  the 
wandering  son  came  home. 

In  the  light  of  these  facts,  —  the  pres¬ 
ence  in  the  paternal  relation  of  authority 
and  obedience,  and  of  hatred  toward  sin 
and  delight  in  goodness,  —  we  may  judge 
whether  this  relation  implies  any  less 
strictness  in  moral  demand  on  the  part  of 
God  than  the  kingly  relation.  Those  who 
dread  the  moral  effect  of  the  paternal  idea 
dread  it  mainly  on  this  ground.  Children 
are  allowed  to  have  their  own  way.  Now¬ 
adays  parental  restraints  are  little  regarded. 
Bad  youths  may  be  afraid  of  the  law,  when 
their  fathers  and  mothers  have  little  influ¬ 
ence  over  them.  To  call  God  a  father,  it 
is  feared,  may  be  to  enthrone  indulgent 
kindness  as  the  ruling  motive  in  his  deal¬ 
ings  with  men ;  or  at  least  the  danger  that 
it  may  be  taken  so  is  greater  than  any  ad¬ 
vantage  in  the  fatherly  conception.  Yet 
this  objection,  common  though  it  is  among 


OF  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  GOD  1 99 


Christians,  is  not  quite  worthy  of  Christian 
judgment  and  feeling.  W e  are  not  intro¬ 
ducing  a  new  idea  when  we  speak  of 
divine  paternity.  Christ  is  our  authority. 
We  all  pray,  as  he  taught  us,  and  teach 
the  little  ones  to  pray,  “Our  Father  who 
art  in  heaven.”  When  Jesus  bade  us  pray 
thus,  he  did  not  mean  that  God  was  a 
foolish  father,  without  holy  aims  and  fam¬ 
ily  discipline.  He  was  not  encouraging  us 
to  suppose  that  God  would  give  us  our 
own  way  to  our  own  injury,  or  that  we 
could  impose  upon  him  by  our  wilfulness. 
God  is  the  one  perfect  Father,  and  an  ideal 
father  is  the  very  one  who  has  the  pro^ 
foundest  motive  to  be  strict  and  steady  in 
moral  requirement.  There  are  good  gov¬ 
ernmental  motives  to  moral  strictness,  hut 
they  do  not  go  so  deep  as  the  family  mo¬ 
tives.  Always  must  a  true  father  require 
the  best  from  his  children,  seeing  that  he 
desires  the  best  for  them.  And,  as  a 
matter  of  present  fact,  solemn  and  stern 


200 


THE  MORAL  EFFECT 


proceedings  are  perpetually  going  on  be¬ 
tween  our  Father  and  ourselves,  in  that 
invisible  realm  of  spirit-life  in  which  even 
now  we  are  all  living.  Upon  every  one 
of  us  is  now  exerted  the  stern  and  unalter¬ 
able  demand  of  God,  who  has  made  us  for 
himself.  God’s  moral  sequences,  though 
invisible,  are  as  invariable  as  his  physical, 
and  his  moral  government,  just  because  it 
is  family  government,  holds  immovably 
the  requirement  that  we  shall  be  true  chil¬ 
dren  to  our  holy  Father.  In  no  other  way 
can  we  prosper.  The  inexorable  demand 
of  God  is  upon  us,  that  we  be  true  sons 
to  him.  Unless  we  do  this,  moral  welfare 
is  to  us  forever  impossible.  Sonship,  let 
us  remember,  though  we  are  born  to  it, 
is  not  complete  until  with  our  own  co¬ 
operation  we  have  been  delivered  from 
evil  and  brought  to  bear  our  Father’s  moral 
likeness.  Our  Father  holds  us  immovably 
to  this  condition,  and  will  make  it  well 
with  us  never,  except  as  his  own  yearning 


OF  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  GOD  201 


heart  has  its  way,  and  we  come  to  live  as 
loyal  children  at  home  with  him. 

Yet  all  this  holy  strictness  and  wise 
severity,  how  different  a  thing  it  is  in  the 
family  from  what  it  is  before  the  throne, 
where  we  stand  not  as  children  but  as  sub¬ 
jects!  How  different  when  there  is  a 
natural  relation  back  of  it,  from  what  it 
is  when  separated  from  the  heart-constrain¬ 
ing  bond !  Here  we  touch  upon  the  great 
ethical  advantage  of  the  family  relation 
between  God  and  men,  when  once  it  is 
rightly  apprehended.  God  has  toward  us 
the  feelings  of  a  father.  This  great  fact 
is  the  foundation  of  the  meaning  of  our 
life,  and  the  manifold  effects  of  it  are  far 
beyond  my  present  power  to  mention. 
The  marvellous  combination  of  hating  the 
sin  and  loving  the  sinner  is  to  us  almost 
an  unlearnable  spiritual  art,  but  so  far  as 
it  is  learned  at  all  on  earth  it  is  mostly 
learned  by  parents.  But  this  is  to  God 
our  Father  an  unacquired  and  eternal  spir- 


202 


THE  MORAL  EFFECT 


itual  nature,  and  the  blessing  of  it  is  ours. 
In  the  family  relation  all  commands  are 
commands  of  one  to  whom  we  are  infi¬ 
nitely  dear,  all  strictness  is  for  the  sake  of 
our  Father’s  final  satisfaction  in  us,  and 
all  severity  is  severity  of  love.  In  the 
family  relation  there  is  opened  to  us  all  the 
fulness  of  an  infinite  patience,  bearing  with 
our  faults  until  they  can  be  cured,  and  all 
the  wealth  of  an  infinite  helpfulness,  and 
all  the  warmth  of  an  infinite  love.  All 
these  unspeakable  gifts  are  freely  ours  to¬ 
day,  and  will  become  fully  ours  in  propor¬ 
tion  as  we  rise  to  the  spiritual  completion 
of  our  sonship.  When  we  set  out  for  our 
home  in  God,  we  have  two  great  consola¬ 
tions  and  inspirations.  One  is,  that  it 
truly  is  our  home,  and  nature  even  in 
ourselves  is  on  our  side;  the  other,  that 
we  are  working  with  the  eternal  reality, 
and  shall  not  work  alone. 

But  I  conceive  that  the  crowning  effect 
of  the  true  doctrine  of  God  in  the  field  of 


OF  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  GOD  203 


morals  is  this,  —  that  in  the  kinship  of 
man  with  God  there  is  laid  an  eternal 
foundation  for  human  ethics.  What  I  am 
about  to  say,  if  I  understand  it  rightly, 
may  be  held  up  in  the  light  either  of 
Christianity  or  of  evolution,  and  be  found 
equally  at  home  in  either  atmosphere. 

I  have  already  spoken  in  these  lectures 
of  the  ideals  that  have  found  expression  in 
the  unfolding  universe  as  ideals  that  not 
only  exist,  but  are  perfectly  realized,  in 
the  mind  that  conceived  the  universe. 
What  God  has  brought  forth  into  being, 
I  have  said,  has  been  progressively  more 
and  more  like  himself.  Thus  his  work 
constantly  expresses  and  represents  him. 
Last  and  highest  of  these  creations  that 
reveal  God  is  that  form  of  being  which  we 
call  personality,  the  fulness  and  unity  of 
thought,  affection,  and  will.  Personality, 
I  have  insisted,  not  only  belongs  to  God, 
but  is  perfect  in  God  alone.  He  is  that 
perfect  person,  of  whose  personality  ours 


204 


THE  MORAL  EFFECT 


is  but  a  “broken  light.”  But  now  let  us 
remember  that  personality  is  a  moral  form 
of  existence;  no,  it  is  the  moral  form  of 
existence.  To  all  personal  being  corre¬ 
sponds  morality.  There  can  be  no  ethics 
where  there  are  not  persons,  and  there  can 
be  no  persons  without  ethics  accompany¬ 
ing  their  life.  And  so  God’s  personality 
is  an  ethical  personality  as  well  as  man’s, 
and  God  has  character.  But  if  the  ideal 
and  perfect  personality  exists  in  God,  the 
ideal  and  perfect  character  must  exist  there 
also.  If  he  is  the  ideal  person,  he  must 
have  the  ideal  character,  or  the  character 
in  which  personality  must  find  its  perfec¬ 
tion.  It  cannot  be  otherwise  than  that  the 
ideal  and  perfect  person  bears  the  charac¬ 
ter  in  which  alone  personality  can  be  per¬ 
fected.  Since  God  is  the  ideal  person, 
God  must  be  the  ideal  of  goodness  for  all 
persons.  There  can  be  no  personality, 
ever  or  anywhere,  that  does  not  have 
for  its  ideal  of  character  that  goodness 


OF  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  GOD  205 


which  is  existing  in  the  ideal  person,  who 
is  God. 

This  is  a  great  truth,  if  it  is  a  truth  at 
all.  It  means  that  for  God  and  men,  and 
for  all  spirits  whatever,  the  moral  world  is 
one.  The  nature  of  ethics  is  everywhere 
the  same,  good  and  evil  are  universal  in 
their  sweep  and  unalterable  in  their 
nature,  and  there  is  one  moral  standard 
for  all.  The  character  that  is  borne  by 
God  is  the  ethical  ideal  for  God,  and  for 
us  men,  and  for  all  spirits  that  ever  ex¬ 
isted  or  may  exist.  The  source  and  fount 
of  existence  is  morally  good,  and  is  such 
as  all  spirits  ought  to  be.  The  true  ethics 
for  men,  therefore,  is  eternally  grounded 
and  sure.  The  good  is  likeness  to  God. 
This  is  the  final  word,  for  God  is  unalter¬ 
able,  and  is  the  ideal  for  all  personal  and 
moral  existence.  No  true  word  can  ever 
be  spoken,  in  any  world,  that  represents 
the  good  as  consisting  in  anything  else 
than  moral  likeness  to  God.  The  mani- 


20  6 


THE  MORAL  EFFECT 


festation  of  that  standard  is  the  progres¬ 
sive  work  of  him  in  whom  it  exists,  and 
conformity  to  that  standard  is  the  one 
hope  of  men. 

The  doctrine  of  the  family  relation  be¬ 
tween  God  and  men  is  simply  the  practical 
and  inspiring  expression  of  this  sublime 
and  all-harmonizing  ethical  reality.  God 
is  the  moral  standard.  The  character  of 
the  Father  is  the  standard  for  the  family. 
What  does  that  mean  to  me?  I  am  a 
young,  weak,  and  unformed  moral  being, 
embarrassed  by  ignorance,  restrained  by 
sin,  incapable  as  yet  of  doing  justice  in 
my  life  to  any  high  ideal  of  morality. 
But  I  have  at  least  learned  what  family  I 
have  been  born  into,  and  in  what  atmos¬ 
phere  it  is  my  privilege  to  be  growing 
up.  There  is  in  existence  a  perfect  moral 
standard ;  and  that  standard  is  my  Father’s 
standard,  and  therefore  mine.  The  kin¬ 
ship  that  I  bear  to  God  makes  God’s  ethics 
my  ethics  too,  by  inalienable  right,  and 


OF  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  GOD  20y 


gives  me  assurance  that  I  am  on  the  right 
and  hopeful  road  when  I  am  rising  toward 
my  best  and  worthiest.  I  do  not  know  all 
that  is  in  my  Father,  but  I  know  that  my 
best  is  most  like  to  him.  In  his  family 
the  purest,  truest,  sweetest  human  is  the 
sure  foreshining  of  the  divine.  Since  I 
am  of  God’s  family,  moral  obligation  is  a 
part  of  my  being,  goodness  is  my  birth¬ 
right,  which  I  have  but  to  claim,  and  the 
worthiest  that  I  can  learn  is  most  akin  to 
my  eternal  ideal  which  exists  in  God  my 
Father. 

This,  I  confess,  is  worth  much  to  me, 
for  here  I  have  found  what  many  are  seek¬ 
ing.  Students  in  ethics  have  searched 
through  the  discoverable  stock  of  infantile 
human  experiences,  seeking  for  the  primal 
sources  of  the  moral  sense.  How  in  the 
early  stages  of  humanity  the  moral  sense 
grew  up,  and  the  idea  of  obligation  was 
developed,  they  have  sought  to  ascertain 
by  analysis  and  guessing  and  the  piecing 


208 


THE  MORAL  EFFECT 


of  facts  together.  The  search  is  legiti¬ 
mate,  and  the  course  of  the  incipient  moral 
sense  and  judgment  may  to  a  great  extent 
be  traced.  Means  of  development  and  occa¬ 
sions  of  direction-taking  may  be  found, 
and  the  ethical  history  of  early  man  may 
in  great  measure  be  brought  to  light.  But 
the  inner  cause  of  the  moral  sense  is  not 
to  be  tracked  out  by  exploring  the  infan¬ 
tile  social  relations  of  primitive  man.  The 
primal  cause  of  the  moral  sense  lies  in  the 
fact  that  man  bears  the  likeness  of  God. 
From  his  earliest  human  moments,  man 
was  akin  to  the  infinite  source  and  ideal  of 
moral  perfection,  and  it  was  his  nature  to 
feel  like  a  child  of  the  perfect  One,  begin¬ 
ning  afar  off  to  grope  after  likeness  to  his 
Father.  From  the  first  hours  of  his  per¬ 
sonality  the  ethical  belonged  to  his  nature 
and  his  life,  and  his  ultimate  moral  stand¬ 
ard  was  just  where  it  is  now  and  will  be 
forever,  in  the  character  of  the  perfect 
God.  So  the  foundation  of  ethics  is  eter- 


OF  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  GOD  20Q 


nal,  and  the  standard  in  morals  is  unalter¬ 
able  ;  and  that  standard,  though  not  fully 
discerned  by  any  of  us,  is  growing  clearer, 
and  our  right  to  claim  it  as  our  own  is 
growing  more  certain  to  us,  with  every 
forward  step  in  ethical  attainment.  The 
moral  effect  of  the  doctrine  of  God,  thus 
presented,  is  the  eternal  grounding  of 
morals  for  man,  and  the  directing  of  hu¬ 
man  ethics  to  the  perfect  and  unchange¬ 
able  ideal.  This  is  the  noblest  service  to 
ethics  that  could  possibly  be  rendered. 

In  these  lectures  I  have  endeavored  to 
show  that  we  cannot  refuse  to  believe  in 
God  as  intelligent  and  as  good,  without 
stultifying  our  own  intellectual  and  moral 
processes;  that  God,  regarded  as  intelli¬ 
gent  and  good,  is  personal,  in  an  intelli¬ 
gible  sense ;  that  the  relation  between  God 
and .  men  is  the  relation  between  a  father 
and  his  children,  —  children,  however,  who 
may  not  know  their  father,  and  who  need 


14 


210 


THE  MORAL  EFFECT 


to  advance  to  the  completion  of  their  son- 
ship  through  holy  fellowship  with  God; 
and  that  this  conception  of  God  and  his  re¬ 
lation  to  men  is  favorable,  not  unfavorable, 
to  sound  and  strong  ethics  in  the  world. 

My  reason  for  presenting  these  views 
has  resided  in  my  strong  conviction  that 
the  idea  of  a  living  and  personal  God  is 
equally  at  home  in  science,  in  philosophy, 
and  in  religion;  and  that  from  whichever 
of  these  fields  this  idea  approaches  us,  the 
true  and  well-supported  conception  of  God 
is  the  paternal  conception.  Moreover,  I 
perceive  that  through  the  joint  influence 
of  Christianity  and  modern  knowledge 
this  paternal  conception  of  God  and  his 
relation  to  men  is  now  coming  to  its  place 
in  religion  and  theology,  never  again  to 
retire.  The  doctrine  of  divine  Father¬ 
hood  has  come,  and  has  come  to  stay. 
Doubtless  it  is  a  doctrine  that  is  easily 
misunderstood  and  easily  misused.  But 
I  am  well  convinced  that  it  is  the  doctrine 


OF  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  GOD  21 1 


of  Jesus  Christ  and  of  all  permanent  Chris¬ 
tianity,  and  that  at  the  same  time  it  is  in 
genuine  harmony  with  the  characteristic 
knowledge  and  thinking  of  the  present 
age.  It  is  not  destined  to  be  displaced  by 
an  advance  in  religion,  or  by  an  advance 
in  science,  or  by  an  advance  in  philosophy, 
or  by  an  advance  in  ethics.  There  is  no 
advance  beyond  it.  It  is  the  true  doc¬ 
trine,  and  will  remain.  It  has  not  yet  had 
the  opportunity  to  show  what  type  of  char¬ 
acter  it  will  bring  forth  in  men  who  are 
fearlessly  taught  it  from  their  youth,  and 
live  all  their  days  in  its  atmosphere.  But 
it  is  adapted  to  produce  the  very  noblest 
moral  fruit;  and  before  it  has  had  even 
half  as  much  time  as  has  been  given  to  the 
kingly  doctrine  of  God  to  show  of  what 
ethical  power  it  is,  it  will  vindicate  itself 
by  disappointing  fears  and  more  than  fulfil¬ 
ling  hopes,  and  training  godlike  character. 

I  have  desired  to  be  helpful  in  clarify¬ 
ing  and  thereby  commending  this  most 


212 


THE  MORAL  EFFECT 


solid  and  beneficent  doctrine,  and  there¬ 
fore  I  have  framed  these  lectures.  At  the 

* 

end  of  our  quest,  however,  rises  the  ques¬ 
tion,  how  far  a  doctrine  is  necessarily  a 
power.  It  looks,  when  once  one  gets  a 
vision  of  the  truth,  as  if  a  clear  and  spir¬ 
itual  doctrine  of  God  ought  fairly  to 
sweep  the  field  in  ethics,  and  transform 
us  promptly  into  faithful  children  of  our 
holy  Father.  But  it  does  not  always  turn 
out  in  that  manner.  Good  doctrines  of 
ethics  are  often  taught,  but  they  do  not 
always  make  good  men  of  students,  or  of 
teachers  either.  Even  this  high  doctrine  of 
the  living,  personal,  and  paternal  God, 
of  the  naturalness  of  religion,  of  the  unity 
of  human  ethics  with  divine,  and  of  the 
everlasting  validity  of  morals,  may,  like 
any  other  doctrine,  be  a  word  of  breath 
but  not  of  power.  No  opinion  studied 
out  is  necessarily  influential  in  transform¬ 
ing  character,  —  not  even  a  noble  opinion 
about  God  and  our  normal  life  with  him. 


OF  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  GOD  213 


What  we  need  is  not  merely  the  moral 
influence  of  the  doctrine  of  God ;  it  is  the 
moral  influence  of  God.  We  want  the 
relation  to  be  realized  in  life,  and  the  gra¬ 
cious  moral  effect  of  the  sonship  to  be 
brought  forth  in  fact.  The  proper  inter¬ 
mediary,  or  connecting  link,  between  a 
true  conception  of  God  and  the  moral 
power  that  corresponds  thereto  is  religion, 
the  actual  personal  life  of  man  in  conscious 
relation  to  the  God  in  whom  he  believes. 
When  one  has  a  right  conception  of  God 
the  Father,  gracious  and  holy,  exacting, 
inspiring,  and  transforming,  the  next  thing 
is  to  take  him  as  Father,  and  let  the  relation 
do  its  transforming  work.  Let  this  never 
be  forgotten.  We  may  light-heartedly 
boast  that  God  is  our  Father,  and  be  ready 
to  go  our  way  in  shallow  peace;  but  the 
question,  “What  kind  of  son  are  you  to 
him,  then?”  ought  to  recall  us  to  our 
senses.  That  is  always  a  fair  question. 
One  who  claims  God  as  Father,  thereby 


214 


THE  MORAL  EFFECT 


admits  his  duty  to  be  toward  God  a  loyal 
son,  and  ought  to  be  living  up  to  that 
duty.  It  is  through  the  practice  and  ex¬ 
perience  of  loyal  sonship  that  the  moral 
influence  of  the  paternal  doctrine  of  God 
is  to  become  effective  upon  us.  Liv¬ 
ing  at  home  with  the  holy  God  as  sons, 
we  shall  receive  the  benefit  of  his  trans¬ 
forming  power. 

So  it  is  well  to  proclaim  the  divine 
Fatherhood  in  its  fulness  and  its  searching 
power,  and  make  it  as  plain  and  impres¬ 
sive  as  we  can,  and  keep  it  year  after  year 
before  the  people ;  not  merely  in  order  that 
men  may  think  correctly  about  it,  but  in 
the  hope  that  they  may  at  length  take  it 
for  true,  and  claim  their  filial  place.  We 
want  to  lead  God’s  sons  up  into  possession 
of  their  full  spiritual  sonship.  We  would 
gladly  bring  them  out  of  their  sin  and  igno¬ 
rance  and  alienation,  home  to  their  glory. 
We  want  all  filial  acts  of  all  sorts  to  be 
performed  and  to  become  habitual,  one  if 


OF  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  GOD  215 


not  another,  of  this  kind  if  not  of  that; 
we  will  he  thankful  for  all  acts  and  for 
any,  in  which  men  conduct  themselves  in 
the  spirit  of  sons  to  God.  We  desire  to 
see  the  human  sonship  completed  in  every 
soul  that  God  has  made,  through  holy, 
loyal  fellowship  with  the  Father.  It  is 
well,  therefore,  to  be  telling  men  of  the 
relation  that  we  desire  to  see  fulfilled. 
As  for  those  who  fear  the  doctrine  lest  it 
weaken  morals  and  religion,  and  those 
who  welcome  it  as  a  doctrine  of  ease  and 
lazy  hope,  both  classes  misunderstand  it, 
and  we  must  help  them  to  see  it  as  it  is. 
In  all  such  endeavor  we  are  laboring  to¬ 
gether  with  God,  who  desires  his  children 
to  know  their  relation  to  him,  in  order  that 
they  may  humbly  enter  into  it  in  its  ful¬ 
ness  and  grow  up  to  their  proper  destiny 
there.  The  mightiest  moral  force  in  the 
world  is  God  himself,  working  for  the  ful¬ 
filment  of  his  own  gracious  counsel  for  his 
human  family. 


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